FreeBEE Honeybee BEE

25 beekeeping enthusiasts BUZZED over to the Taghhannuck Grange Hall to Motherhouse's first FREE-BEE honeybee BEE. BEEginner, experienced, and wanna-BEE beekeepers shared their stuff!

Todd Shearer brought in and showed us a top bar hive designed by the Barefoot Beekeeper, He chose this style BEEcause he could build it himself and the bees are usually calmer to work. His family is dedicated to working with nature to create a permiculture, bio- and educationally diverse yard... I call it "Shearer Heaven."

Wyatt Whiteman showed us his elegantly simple homemade solar wax cleaning system. Using all recycled materials; wooden box with scrap lumber props, black plastic paint tray, food tray, hardware cloth, and window frame painted with leftover paint,
Wyatt lays wax scraps on the hardware cloth, closes the window; the sun melts the wax; it drips onto the paint tray, runs down into the lower edge, thru the small center opening, into the smaller food tray; leaving debris behind.

To make candles, he pours the wax from the food tray directly into a mold. He threads the mold with a long length of wicking, and winds it around the mold to keep it closed. When removing the candle, he pulls just enough wick through the mold to set it up for the next candle.

Joe Benete showed us the "tools of the the trade." Then a panel of  backyard beekeepers waxed enthusiastically about their experiences.

Fair-trade, organic coffee and chai tea made with local B&B honey and Thorncrest Dairy milk was generously provided by Coffee, Tea, Etc.
To deter bears, panelists recommended Sonpal's Power Fence (860 491-2290) and/or keeping goats, and a cow, and many active children in the yard.

After a honey of a potluck lunch, local herbalist Alicia North of North Star Botanicals , gave a BEEutiful presentation of foraging honeybees and BEEnificial plants.

Visit the Motherhouse website for a fellow beekeeper's poem about beekeeping and life.