GUILDERLAND — Amy Castillo and her husband realized their dream a few years ago when they were able to buy a farm on Brandle Road.

They named it Kava La Reina Farm. “Kava” means “bee” in Guarani, an indigenous language of South America and an official language of Paraguay.  So their farm’s name translates to “queen bee.”

The couple met in Paraguay as Peace Corps workers. “My husband was a beekeeper there,” said Amy Castillo.

Before she was married, when she was named Amy Paquette, she taught Spanish at Farnsworth Middle School and, along with other good works, helped build a school in a small village in Nicaragua in 1996.

The Castillos keep bees at their farm and sold honey in a farmstand at the foot of their driveway. “It’s totally organic,” said Castillo of the honey. The Castillos also grow and sell organic Porcelain garlic, which has large cloves with strong flavor and satiny white wrappers. The Castellos sold honeycomb, too.

Kava La Reina honey is raw, which some customers believe has added health benefits. “We don’t process it at all; we just strain it,” said Castillo.

The farmstand worked on an honor system where patrons could pick up various-sized jars of honey, each marked with a price, and deposit the money in a slotted metal box.

Last year, during Fair Week, Castillo said, “Every single jar of honey was stolen.”

The problem continued, even after the Altamont Fair closed. “People would take two pounds of honey and just put in two bucks,” said Castillo.

She has now placed a sign on the farmstand that says, “Due to repeated theft and dishonesty, we can no longer afford to sell our honey at the stand.” The shelf, once filled with amber-hued jars of honey and baskets of garlic, is now bare.

Customers are welcome to call Costillo to place orders, she said. She also sells their honey at Gade Farm on Western Avenue in Guilderland.

“We have some great customers,” Castillo said. “People will call us and we do a lot of delivering … Most people are awesome.”

She is disheartened, though, by the thefts her family has endured. “If I didn’t have the money and I really needed the honey, I’d leave a note and come back the next day to pay,” she said.

She noted some of her neighbors on the quiet country road sell their produce, too, from farm stands.

Costillo concluded, “We always wanted to have a farm, and we got it. We’re working hard to keep it.”