In this month’s Beeline we will be recapping our October 5th PUB meeting. Our next meeting on Wednesday, November 7th will be at our NEW LOCATION – Rose City Park United Methodist Church located at 5830 NE Alameda St. Click here for directions. DO NOT meet at Alberta Abbey.
This coming Wednesday is our annual PUB Showcase! This will be an opportunity for all PUB members to show off your bee-related projects, plans, products, and employment. Whether you make a living, supplement your income, or just have fun with bees, you are invited to set up a table to show off what you enjoy doing. Spaces are free and tables will be provided. Please email us to reserve your table. Please show up at 6pm to set up your table.
Once again, and in supreme style, Bridgetown Bees’ Glen Andresen shared his monthly Pollen & Nectar report with his extensive slideshow on current flowering plants. As he does each month, Glen provides information on the many blooming nectar and pollen plants still out there that are keeping our girls busy through November/December. For a more detailed report check out Bridgetown Bees for Glen’s monthly “What’s in bloom” report. If you run across any interesting honey bee plants be sure to email Glen with any photos and/or suggestions.
Our featured speaker this month was Mark Johnson. Mark is a former Vice President of OSBA and veteran of 44 years as a commercial beekeeper. Mark, who has over 1200 hives, provides pollination services to farmers starting with the California almond bloom in February, moving from crop to crop all spring and summer, until the time when he harvests honey in August. Honey harvesting is one of the more expense processes a beekeeper does and Mark shared which processes work best for him. “We do both pollination and honey, but honey is only about 20 percent. In western Oregon if you tried to keep bees for honey you’d go broke, it’s mainly renting hives to farmers.” Many thanks to Mark for sharing his big-picture view of what beekeeping is like for him, his family, and employees throughout the year.
Congratulations go out to Michael Carlson and Lil Reitzel who won the OSBA conference giveaway. We hope to post their experiences of the conference to our PUB Blog and Facebook page in the coming weeks. Stay tuned!
Upcoming Events
PUB Bee School is scheduled for Saturday, January 28th, 2017. If you or a friend have been wanting to take a beginning beekeeping course registration is now open. Click here for more info and to register.