Pre-Fair SVBA Meeting /
Booth Set-up
Noon, Sunday, August 4th
Barn D, Fairgrounds in Mt. Vernon

We will have a very brief meeting at fair before rolling up our sleeves and completing the exhibit. Join us if you can at our booth in Barn D at noon. There is no charge on the set-up day, so park nearby and just walk in.
 
Board member Heather Oates composes our booth, which has a combination of returning displays and new elements that feature a theme. This year, the theme is "Waggle Dance". There's a brief explanation of waggle dancing and bees in a short piece, below.

SVBA and the Skagit County Fair
Thursday, August 8 to Sunday, August 11

It's finally here, the 2024 edition of the Skagit County Fair. As he has in the past, Rob Johnson has set the stage for the SVBA's participation as our Fair Superintendent.

In addition to the preparatory meeting and set up, there are other ways to get involved:

Drop-off Your Entries
Honey Judging Event
Noon, Sunday August 4 or
Tuesday, August 6, 4 PM to 7 PM

You will need to drop off you entries during either of these designated times at our booth in Barn D in the Fairgrounds in Mt. Vernon. Remember, you have to drop off the entry in person, and you can pay the entry fee and get your entry number assigned when you arrive.

The rules and categories are all described on the Skagit County Fair website for Exibits in Open Class Honey, and you can click this link HERE to get this information   Susan DeLawter has provided excellent coaching for those new to participating, and a few of her tips are included in last month's newsletter. If you still need official bottles for your entry or have last minute questions, contact Susan at susandelawter@sbcglobal.net

Categories are available for adults (18 or older), youth (ages 6-11), and youth (ages 12-17). 

Classes for entries include:

• Extracted honey in official glass jars, sorted by color: light, light amber, amber, and dark
• Novelty jars with honey in unique, interesting containers
• Frame honey categorized according to the size and type of frame including a special category, "heaviest frame" judged on weight only
• Posters by students for the Sexton Award, open to students up to 18 years of age that submit a poster or presentation to display what they have learned about bees

Staff the Booth
During the Fair

For a wonderful experience, you can sign up and help staff the SVBA booth. You don't need to be an "expert", just someone who would like to share a bit of your interest and knowledge with curious fairgoers. There were still a few openings when this newsletter was being prepared, and you can check the status on our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/skagitvalleybeekeepers/

If you can help out and are available at any of those times, contact call Heather Oates, hoates@gmail.com, or Rob Johnson, rsjohnson2u@yahoo.com

There is no Fair entry fee for booth volunteers if you can arrange to get a pass through Heather or Rob.

Come and Enjoy the Fair
Spend a few hours

If nothing else, just come and enjoy the Fair; it is a genuine, real-deal, local county fair with lots to see, including all of the cultural and agricultural dimensions of the Skagit community.

This is the inaugural season for the SVBA Apiary in a field behind the Terramar Brewery in Edison. You will find our hives there, lined up and thriving. Ongoing activities at the apiary are posted on the website at https://skagitvalleybeekeepers.org. If you haven't been, stop by our host for a brew, too. 

Hive-side days at the Apiary
Every Wednesday in July, 10 AM to Noon

Regular hive maintenance and an educational opportunity coincide every Wednesday in the late morning at the apiary. It's interesting to keep up with the progression of our five colonies, and learn from the attending beekeeper as we check on them.

Apiary Field Day
Sunday, August 18 from 10 AM to Noon

This is the day when we will begin winter prep for our colonies - a hands-on session that you won’t want to miss with Dawn Beck, our apiary guru. Mite control is critical at this time, so that the bees can create and maintain a strong population of healthy winter bees that will persist through the cold months ahead.

September Speaker 
WSU's Lisa DeVetter on Bees and Pollination
September 12 at the SVBA Meeting
Public Library in Sedro-Woolley

The meeting program in September will feature Lisa DeVetter, Associate Professor, Small Fruit Horticulture at WSU. Lisa is based at the Northwestern Washington Research and Extension Center in Mount Vernon and knows about the relationship between our regional fruits and the pollination roles of honeybees. She focuses on raspberries, strawberries, and highbush blueberries - which is a good thing, because our bees focus on the same things. 

WASBA Statewide Conference
Friday, October 4 to Sunday, October 5
Embassy Suites in Lynnwood

This year's annual conference of the Washington State Beekeepers Association (WASBA) is not far away from us, in Lynnwood. It always has an impressive list of speakers and is an opportunity to share insights with beekeepers from all over. To get your tickets, you can go through their website at https://wasba.org/

Domie Bourgeois is a newcomer to beekeeping, entering her fourth season. Beekeeping was a logical extension of her passion for gardening, which expanded during the early Covid-19 era as her home garden began taking on more of a farmyard character, including chickens. At first, she thought beekeeping might be reserved for specialists, and not for regular gardeners. But her curiosity about colonial insects led her to an online introductory course organized by the Washington State Beekeepers Association (WASBA) - and she was hooked.

She is still surprised about how challenging beekeeping can be, and is learning more every year. Just after acquiring her first colony, she lost the queen. But she successfully replaced her and watched as they recovered. A big challenge since then has been a common problem here - getting colonies to survive the winters.
 
Domie has stepped up to become a member of the SVBA leadership team, serving as our treasurer and website coordinator. She is using her interest in graphic design to come up with a new logo for the SVBA, too. We appreciate her help and the chance to get to know her as a beekeeping neighbor.

A friendly bee escaped from our demonstration hive at the County Fair last year, and wandered over to the booth with the big flower display. She was looking for an opening line, but all she could come up with was "Hey bud".

Our annual July picnic in the park was particularly well attended this year, thanks to great food and great weather. There were lots of opportunities for new and long-time beekeepers to share tips and tales of their experiences. We learned ...

• Not a good June for honey - Many of the senior beekeepers indicated that the June honey flow was much less than they have seen in past years, despite the blackberries blossoming.
• Lots of new beekeepers - Many of the folks who came are recent graduates of the spring course for beginning beekeepers that the  SVBA staged in concert with the Mount Baker Beekeeping Association. Welcome!
• Burger fest - Everyone seemed to notice that the burgers were particular good this year, thanks to head chef Brett DeLawter. There was always a short line waiting for more cheeseburgers to get pulled off the grill, creating an occasion to chat and catchup, prior to applying the ketchup.

What is a "waggle dance"? No, it's not a scene from an old Elvis Presley movie. 
 
In a beekeeping context, the waggle dance is the amazing method that forager bees employ among themselves to communicate fruitful locations to gather nectar, pollen, or water sources. It is also the theme for our booth this year at the Skagit County Fair.
 
The Austrian Karl von Frisch was a scientist in behavioral zoology credited with decoding the elaborate behavior of bees about a century ago. Based on his meticulous observations, he documented how returning honeybees transmit both the distance and direction to food and water resources to other forager bees in the hive.
 
A returning bee that has found a great location will parade around in a figure-8 pattern within the hive; the angle of the dance indicates the direction of the target, and the number of waggles indicates its distance from the hive. Other forager bees form an audience, absorbing the information.

Professor von Frisch first published his findings about a century ago. He was eventually awarded a Nobel Prize for his work.
 
Subsequent research indicates that bees do not always follow the waggle dance instructions. Instead, most foragers will first return to a place that they had already found to be productive. Bees pay more attention to the waggle dance instructions if they find that their first choice is tapped out. Pretty smart, huh!

For many SVBA beekeepers, the honey will be harvested by the middle of the month, and the focus is on solidifying colonies for the winter. Dawn Beck, a master beekeeper among us, reminds us that fall planning for successful overwintering begins NOW. August is the rime for getting the inside of the hives ready for winter. Here is her standard for a solid colony before winter begins:

• Near zero mites
• A strong colony, ideally 18-20 frames covered in bees
• 50% of the frames filled with capped honey (or capped sugar syrup)

She strongly recommends application of formic mite treatments in early August, even if the honey supers are still on. This allows time (21 days) for a generation of nurse bees to grow without excessive mites.  This generation of fat healthy nurse bees are the ones that will be feeding the brood that will be your winter bees.

She inserts a 1/2 treatment dose of pads that you can find online, with the doses a couple of weeks apart to keep the intensity down. For those of us who collect our honey at the end of the month or later, products are available that are compatible with subsequent honey gathering and consumption.

Membership in the SVBA
Join or Renew

Annual membership dues are for a calendar year and there is still plenty of time to renew, join or rejoin your SVBA membership. Annual dues are only $12 (or $13 using our online payment system). It's a high value investment and supports the wide range of programs and events that we offer. The membership form and payment instructions are found on our website or by clicking HERE.

The online payment option can be accessed by clicking HERE.

Skagit Valley Beekeepers Association

Brett DeLawter              President  brettdelawter@gmail.com
Dawn Beck                    Vice President   dawnrunner@live.com
Domie Bourgeois         Treasurer/Website Manager domie.bourgeois@gmail.com
Brenda Crossley          Secretary   brendacrossley49@gmail.com
Steve Cecil                    Newsletter  cecilbees121@gmail.com
Don Johnson                Board   homebrewtwo@gmail.com
Jim Kohl                        Board
Heather Oates               Board  hoates@gmail.com
Seth Smith.                   Board   seth_smith@live.com
Chris Zimmerman        Board  gocougs87@gmail.com
Matt and Nikki Jones   SVBA Equipment Managers  lamesican@gmail.com