Wilson County Beekeepers

Meeting Minutes – 28 July 2014

With 98 members and guests in attendance, Carey Mitchell, President of Wilson County Beekeepers Assn. welcomed everyone to the July 28, 2014 meeting at the Ward Ag Center..

Membership approved the July 7 minutes as posted in the last newsletter.

Old Business Discussed:

• Items still available for sale:
  Shirts–$15.00/Hats–$10.00
  Pollen Substitute–$1.75/pound
  Beetle Traps–$1.00/Beetle Jails–$1.50
  40 lb. buckets of Sugar–$20.00
  Fair Entry jars—70 cents each

• Fair schedule still has a few spaces open and anyone wanting to work a shift was asked to see Petra. Passes and schedules were available for those already signed up
• Items for the Raffle Basket(s) were accepted and any other items can be brought the day entries are taken at the Fair, or added to the basket on the nights folks man the booth
• Will have a sign-up sheet at the fair for the Short Course set for October 21-23.
• Grant Recipients were reminded to donate their portion, if they got honey this year
• TBA Fall Conference will be at Tennessee Tech at the Hyder Burks Pavilion. Twelve scholarships are offered, so if you are a first-time attendee, put your name on the list with Petra. Recipients will be drawn at the next meeting
• 8-ounce honey containers were still available for anyone wanting to donate honey

New Business Discussed:

• New library books for the three public libraries have been purchased…Honeybee Biology and Beekeeping by Dewey Caron. Also a copy is available for the Association’s library. Tony Mercante volunteered to take the copy to Mt. Juliet, and Karen Dawson will take the one to Lebanon. Petra had already delivered Watertown’s copy.
• Putting together a “Local Honey For Sale’ list for the fair. Anyone wanting to get their name on the list is to see Petra

Fred’s To-Do List:

• Removing Supers— Do not get greedy / Put extracted supers on hive

• Donate some honey for the fair
• Make sure water is available nearby…source should not be your neighbor’s pool
• Ventilation
• READ—READ—READ

Our speaker for the evening was TBA’s Middle TN Regional Vice President and President of Beekeepers of TN, Jim Garrison. He spoke a bit about TBA and the upcoming Conference. His program on Working with Wax…cleaning, molding, and candle making was quite informative and several questions were asked.

Announcements:

• Next meeting—September 8…Kent Williams will discuss Fall & Winter Management
• The North Alabama Beekeepers Symposium is set for August 16…Petra will forward details via email

Carey and Fred proceeded to hand out this evening’s door prizes:

• Frame Grip from John Sharpe was won by James Robinson
• Charles Grogan won a vitex bush
• JD Ginder won a bag of Honey Candy from Kelley’s
• Bill George won a bee brush
• Shellie Meador took home a honey sticker from the National Honey Board
• Andrew Robinson got a honey dipper
• Evelyn Reece donated a pot of Virginia Copperleaf which was won by Lucy Stoffel
• Fred & Karen Dawson donated a box of blueberries which Les Reece won.

Carey read a note from New Leash on Life reflecting their appreciation for items and monies donated to them at the picnic.

Meeting adjourned around 8:15 for refreshments and fellowship.

Respectfully submitted: Petra Mitchell, Secretary/Treasurer—Wilson County Beekeepers Association, July 29, 2014

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