Beeline

PUB’s November 4th meeting was held at a different venue, Tabor Space, where we had our annual PUB Showcase event. This is an opportunity for members and guests to show off and even sell their products, equipment, share recipes, collaborate on ideas, and socialize. Beekeeping opens up a whole world of industry and innovation and we like to help support that and get the word out. We had a very good turnout for this event and quite easily filled the Copeland Commons room at Tabor Space. Next year we’re going to have to find a bigger room!

Our December meeting was also held in the same room at Tabor Space, but due to bad weather and an unusual change in date, the attendance wasn’t quite as high. But we had a really fun time at our annual Honey Tasting event. Every year we get together to sample the members’ honeys and nosh on snacks. Attendees get to vote on their favorites and prizes were awarded. This year we added to the event by including a Photo & Art contest where members could show their bee-themed art. We also helped a local soup kitchen, Free Hot Soup, collect some honey donations to be used in their recipes or to be served with tea to help the homeless in Portland.

In February we’ll be holding our Bee School, aimed at helping brand new beekeepers get started. Saturday, February 6th, 10am – 4pm at the Urban Farm Store. Students can register on our website. Please help spread the word to those you mentor!

At PUB’s  October 7th, we ate cake to thank Dewey Caron for all of his contributions this year, he will be overwintering in Bolivia. Glen Andresen gave his monthly pollen & nectar report, which he had to adjust this year to accommodate the long bloom season. Dewey warns that with a long bloom season comes late brood rearing, leading to an increase in varroa mites.

We had the return of the PUB Spotlight, where we invite members to share their beekeeping experience. We heard from Carolyn, a first year beekeeper who’s learning quickly and now spends her free time watching the bees come and go. Additionally, Luca, a fifteen year old beekeeper, joined us along with his family. At age nine, Luca was living in France and followed a curiosity in beekeeping to a town in southern France, Cevennes. There, he was introduced to traditional beekeeping, using hollowed-out chestnut trees. Luca developed a passion for beekeeping and now has four thriving hives, one which he’s given to his younger brother.

As our duties in the hive wind down for the year, we’re getting excited for some events coming up this winter:

Our November 4th meeting will come with a location change to Tabor Space where we’ll be hosting a Show & Tell. Members and guests are encouraged to show off their products and share recipes. We will invite local companies to share what they are doing, and people can bring items to sell.

In December, we will change both location and meeting date. We will be meeting on Tuesday, December 1st at Tabor Space for PUB’s Photo and Art contest. We’ll be having a potluck and honey tasting to compliment the art. There will be prizes, so get your art ready!

PUB’s September 2nd meeting was focused on practical advice from Dewey Caron on how to use this fall season to prepare our hives to overwinter. Additionally, Bill Catherall showed off the delightful video he composed for the OSBA State Fair booth, which put a spotlight on various beekeepers in the area.

Glen Andresen, who Bill Catherall refers to as our “Beekeeper extraordinaire and master gardener” was back this month showing off his new inventive way to clean old diseased frames. He places his frames on his compost pile, where soldier fly larvae who rapidly eat through the wax. Soldier flies are attracted to anything high in organic matter. Glen exclaimed, “bring me your feces, your tired frames!”

PUB would like to thank our friends at Bee Allies. Bee Allies provided us with a swarm hotline. The hotline was a success, with about 100 PUB members responding to over 300 calls.

We’re getting excited for some events coming up this fall and winter:

At our November meeting, we’ll be hosting a Show & Tell where members and guests are encouraged to show off their products and share recipes. We will invite local companies to share what they are doing, and people can bring items to sell.

Get your bee-related art projects ready to show at PUB’s December Photo and Art contest, complete with prizes. We’ll be having a potluck and honey tasting to compliment the art.

While Glen Andresen was busy flipping pancakes at the family booth of Junction City’s Scandavian Festival, Dr. Dewey Caron took over our August 5th meeting with practical advice for how to start the beekeepers new year off and transition into fall. His presentation was full of a vibrant Q&A from our members, mostly around feeding and requeening practices. As we help our bees prepare to overwinter, Dewey reminded us of last year’s Pacific Northwest honey bee loss survey results (pnwhoneybeesurvey.com), debunking some practices as statistically insignificant, and some as trends. Very few practices showed significant success in preventing overwinter losses, such as chemically treating for varroa mites. Dewey, as always, encourages us all to try new overwintering techniques and share our results in the 2016 survey!

PUB’s apiary at Zenger Farm has seen some exciting growth this year! We started the year with two hives, and to that have added eight nucleus hives, resulting in twelve hives going into fall. The property has been cleaned up, with fresh woodchips and improved shelters and equipment. Zenger Farm is dedicated to education and experimentation. See our calendar to find out when the next volunteer work party is, they are an amazing way to get beekeeping experience!

We’re getting excited for some events coming up this fall and winter:

At our November 4th meeting we’ll be hosting a Show & Tell where members and guests are encouraged to show off their products and share recipes. We will invite local companies to share what they are doing, and people can bring items to sell.

Get your bee-related art projects ready to show at PUB’s December 1st Photo and Art contest, complete with prizes. We’ll be having a potluck and honey tasting to compliment the art.

Our July 1st meeting came chalk-full of practical beekeeping advice from our local experts, as well as some thought-provoking conversations about hive treatment methods and philosophies.

Tour De Hives, PUB’s biggest annual event, was a huge success this year! Thanks to all of the volunteers and hosts who helped make it possible. With this year’s success, we hope to expand next year to be even bigger and better! As such, we are currently looking for volunteers for next year’s planning committee.

Our website has a new Classifieds section. Become a PUB member to take advantage of our local trading post for beekeeping equipment, goods, and services.

Following Glen Andresen’s always popular “What’s In Bloom This Month” Dewey Caron gave his monthly “Do You Have A Plan” presentation. While we were challenging the bees by oversupering last month, this month he encourages us to undersuper with the goal of getting the bees to finish up partially filled honey frames. Dewey also encourages us to continue tracking our mite counts to give context as we move into fall.

PUB supports beekeepers of all methodologies, and this month Bill Catherall gave a presentation on Treatment-Free Beekeeping. He outlined the spectrum of methods, ranging from natural to industrial. He then talked through a number of hive management techniques through the eyes of a treatment-free beekeeper, whose goal is to work with natural selection with the goal of allowing genetically strong bees to prosper while genetically weaker hives die out. Ultimately, he opened up the floor for discussion around a hybrid varroa mite treatment approach proposed by Dr. Dennis vanEngelsdorp, with the Bee Informed Partnership. To read more, check out Bill’s blog post on our website.

Our June 3rd meeting was filled with practical information from local beekeepers.

Bill Catherall gave a great presentation on beekeeping record keeping. He’s a big advocate for record keeping so you can do “bee math” in order to plan well by anticipating when brood will emerge. Additionally, record keeping is a great tool to track your hive’s health. Bill showed us all sorts of innovative tracking tools, including using bricks, paper templates, and duct tape. He reminds us that whatever works for us is the right way to do it!

Dewey Caron was back this month with advice on what to do in the hive this month. He reminds us to challenge the bees by giving plenty of super space. He warns that this year might not be a great year to harvest all of the supers. This is an early year, and the bees might need that extra honey to overwinter. Dewey recommends starting to test for mites. Testing early gives us a baseline so that when we take fall mite numbers there’s some context.

Dewey also presented some early results from the Pacific Northwest Honey Bee Survey. Good news shows less loss than last year! To check out the survey, visit http://pnwhoneybeesurvey.com/survey-results/2015-survey-reports/. Dewey and his team are still crunching numbers, so stay tuned for more exciting results. If you find this information helpful, please participate in next year’s survey!

Our main event was a Q&A panel, moderated by Dewey Caron. The panel consisted of three beekeepers with varying backgrounds. Mike card is a fourth year beekeeper with seven colonies. Kerry Jahanne, a beekeeper and orchardist and recent transplant from New York has 14 years of beekeeping experience. While she managed 40 colonies in New York, she’s still looking forward to starting her first in Portland. Our final panelist was a Portland beekeeping fixture and PUB veteran, Glen Andresen, who has 25 years of beekeeping experience and currently manages 80 hives. The questions revolved mostly around the pros and cons of foundation vs. foundationless, and the ways to track and manage mites.

PUB is excited to be sponsoring the bee booth at the Oregon State Fair on Saturday, August 29th. Come say hi!

Our May 6th meeting was the first to be held at our new home, Alberta Abbey. It is a lovely venue which is big enough to accommodate our rapidly growing membership!

Our swarm hotline by Honey Bee Allies is up and running, and very active! To report a swarm call (503) 444-8446. Members can register to receive swarms, or to be a swarm mentor or mentee. If you’re interested, register at Bit.ly/pubswarmlist.

PUB will be hosting a photo and art contest. If you’re interested, start taking pictures or creating your art projects, and stay tuned for further submission details. Judging will take place at our annual winter honey tasting event.

Our Education Committee is requesting donations of fun educational materials. There’s a request for bee or flower hats, games (such as a beanbag toss), an a photo cutout stand. Additionally, we’d like to start collecting samples for an entomology display.

Tour de Hives will be taking place on June 20th. PUB is still looking for hosts and assistants. If you’re interested in participating, please volunteer at bit.ly/TourVolunteer2015.

At the meeting, Glen Andresen gave his monthly pollen and nectar report. Speaking of Glen, Dewey Caron wrote a lovely article on Glen in Bee Culture this month called, “Beekeeper, Gardner, Teacher: Glen Andresen.” Tim Wessels, our former PUB president, gave a presentation on “What to do in the Hive This Month”, where he spoke mostly of swarm control and supering.

We proceeded to gather for breakout sessions, divided by beekeeping experience. We had large groups of new beekeepers, which is very exciting!

Our monthly meeting on April 1st came with some exciting announcements!

First, our new swarm hotline is now live! We’ve partnered with Honey Bee Allies. They have created a swarm list tool for us that will be available to our membership. We will be retiring our old swarm list. To be a part of the PUB swarm list and take advantage of our new hotline (503 444-8446) for swarm notifications, register at bit.ly/pubswarmlist.

PUB will be hosting a photo and art contest. If you’re interested, start taking pictures or creating your art projects, and stay tuned for further submission details. Judging will take place at our annual winter honey tasting event.

Tour de Hives will be taking place on June 20th. PUB is still looking for hosts and assistants. If you’re interested in participating, please volunteer at bit.ly/TourVolunteer2015.

Glen Andreson gave his monthly pollen and nectar report. With this early spring, most of the fruit trees have finished blooming, and the great bee plants haven’t started blooming just yet. To see a full report, visit BridgetownBees.com/whats-in-bloom/.

Carolyn Breece gave an enthusiastic presentation on the Oregon Master Beekeeper Program, a collaboration between Oregon State University and Oregon State Beekeepers Association. It’s an exciting intensive beekeeping program, designed to support beekeepers at all levels. It starts with the Apprentice level, where beekeepers are matched with master mentors to support their learning in the field. Students can continue their training and education at the Journey level, and finally if a student completes the whole program, they will become a Master Beekeeper. Certification is available, but not required to participate. Many of the mentors in the Portland area are PUB members! For more information on the program and how to get on the waiting list, see OregonMasterBeekeeper.org.

Dewey Caron presented findings on last winter’s survey results. To participate in this winter’s survey, visit pnwhoneybeesurvey.com. This survey helps us share information and continue to develop best practices for overwintering bees in our unique Pacific Northwestern climate. Additionally, he gave his monthly “What Is Your Plan” presentation, where he reminded us that April is “the cruelest month.” As overwintered adults die off, and brood ramps up, the hive can be left in a vulnerable moment. He predicts that the early spring this year will mean a big beekeeping season, and some special practices might be interesting to try, such as opening the brood area to the supers to alleviate crowding. He reminds us to set out bait hives and be sure to have extra boxes and frames ready for the big swarm season upon us!

Portland Urban Beekeepers held our second general membership meeting of the year on March 4, 2015. With an increase in memberships, we’ve once again had a packed house and have officially outgrown Calaroga Terrace. Our next meeting, April 1st, will be held at the Matt Dishman Community Center. This is a temporary location as we continue to scout out a more permanent home.

Dewey Caron and Janai Fitzpatrick are putting the finishing touches on this year’s PUB Winter Loss survey. We’ll be releasing it regionally by the end of the March. Additionally, PUB members have a marvelous opportunity to enlist on Hive Tracks Pro for free. Hive Tracks helps you with your beekeeping records, and this program allows PUB to see trends across our group and share it with our members. A coupon code will be issued to all PUB members.

Tour de Hives will be on June 20. PUB is looking for Portland apiaries that would like to be a part of the tour. We’re also looking for volunteers to be host assistants at each of the tour stops. If you are interested, please sign up here http://bit.ly/TourVolunteer2015.

Dewey Caron has returned to PUB with his What to Do in the Hive This Month. He advised on hive maintenance in this early spring we are having in Portland. He encouraged everyone to test honey stores through hive hefting, as well as a very brief inspection. He reminded us to not disrupt any of the frame arrangements at this time.

Jacqueline Freeman, a biodynamic farmer and pioneer in the emerging field of natural beekeeping, gave a passionate presentation on swarms. She went into depth about why and how swarming happens and shared wonderful photos and videos of capturing swarms on her farm. She encourages beekeepers to let their hives swarm because it is natural and supports healthy breeding. Jacqueline enjoys listening to her bees, and her new book, “THE SONG OF INCREASE: Returning to our Sacred Partnership with Honeybees” is named after her favorite bee process, swarming. You can follow Jacqueline on her website, SpiritBee.com.

Our meetings are digitally recorded into blocks of video that usually correspond to our meeting agendas and posted to YouTube soon after.

Video Link

Video Link

Portland Urban Beekeepers held its first general membership meeting of the year the first Wednesday of January. We held new officer elections alongside the 2nd annual PUB showcase, where local business-owners and hobbyists shared their goods and projects. Among the displays were hives and the book “Winged” from Bee Thinking, the book “The Song of Increase” by Jacqueline Freeman, a candle-making demonstration from Brandi Rodgers of Ruhl Bee Supply, lip balms from Rachel Glaeser, a bee vacuum and homemade preserves from Brian Lacy of Live Honeybees, beehive woodenware and portland-raised survivor bee program from Tim Wessels and Glen Andreson of Bridgetown Bees, and hive scale, quiltbox, homemade deodorant, and candles from Bill Catherall of The Bee Vlog.

February kicked off our regular general membership meetings for 2015.

Lois Leveen was ecstatic to share the results of her efforts working with The City of Portland and Multnomah County to address the signature approval requirement to keep bees. Thanks to her hard work, the signature requirement has officially been reduced to a notification requirement. This has allowed Portland beekeepers an easier path to compliance with Portland City law, and many PUB  members have already taken advantage of the change.

Robert Leger spoke about The Yellow Jacket Free Home. He gave us an introduction to the yellow jacket biology and life cycle, as well as helpful tips on trapping and controlling them.

Our feature speaker, Dan Carr, gave a dynamic presentation about his experiences working with beekeepers and farmers in Malawi and Uganda. He learned to keep bees from a Malawian school teacher, and together they started the Mwazisi beekeepers association.  After returning to the United States and managing Stone Barns’ bees for three years, he was invited by the USAid Farmer to Farmer program to go back to Africa to work on a special project with a beekeepers cooperative in Kasese, Uganda called the Liberty Development Foundation LIDEFO. He spoke of the unique challenges of keeping bees in Africa, such as honey badgers, elephants, and poachers. He showed off the resourcefulness in hive design with top-bar hives made of bamboo and threads stripped from recycled tires. He had rich photographs and stories of his time, and reminded us that it’s not about the bees, it’s about the people.

Calaroga Terrace has been generous in accommodating our monthly membership meetings, but as membership continues to increase, we seem to be outgrowing the space. We are looking for suggestions of alternate venues that can accommodate up to 200 people.

Our meetings are digitally recorded into blocks of video that usually correspond to our meeting agendas and posted to YouTube soon after.

Video Link

Video Link