Contact the Education Officer, Mr Derrick Harris     for more information.

Introduction from the new Education Officer.

Derrick Harris


Since I have just been elected as the new Education Officer for the Lancashire and North West BKA, I thought it appropriate to introduce myself and encourage people to contact me with ideas.

I have been keeping bees about 4 years, so I am still only learning. However I would hope still to be learning even if I reach 44 years of beekeeping! I am with the Ormskirk & Croston Branch, but the role of Education Officer extends throughout all the Branches. So all beekeepers in all the Branches should feel free to contact me.

My understanding is that the role of Education Officer has traditionally been to organise the Annual Convention, arrange a speaker for the honey show and ensure the exams take place each year.

I am happy to do that, although Barabara Roderick will be a very difficult act indeed to follow.

However this change is also a good time for all beekepers to think about two things:

1) Is there anything which you think should (or should not...) be done, or can be done differently?

2) Very importantly, are there beekeepers out there who are prepared to get involved in any new/different ideas?

Beekeeping is unlikely to get any easier in years to come, so the more we beekeepers are able to learn, the better it is likely to be for our bees. Of course this "learning" can be both practical and theoretical in nature.

So if anyone has any thoughts and/or is able to lend a hand, please get in touch. I will be very pleased to hear from anyone.


Derrick Harris

derrick.harris@ormskirkbeekeepers.co.uk



RESUME OF EDUCATION PLANNING MEETING

Held on Monday August 24th 2009


Representatives from all seven branches of the Lancashire & N.W. Beekeepers’ Association met in Burscough to discuss the future education in the County.

Lancaster is a very large branch and although they are moving to join the BBKA as a separate entity, running independently, they still plan to work in collaboration with the County.

 

It was thought that as the County was geographically quite wide spread, for some of these activities we would split into two;  with Blackburn, Preston and Blackpool working in the north of the county and Ormskirk, Liverpool and Southport as the other group in the south.  Lancaster branch has already been running a full education programme for some years now and we decided it would be good to take some of their initiatives and develop for other branches.  It was decided to run a range of activities throughout the year. 

This a brief outline of our plans.



SPRING/SUMMER 2010

TRAINING THE TRAINERS

1) Using recent newcomers to help, mentor next year’s intake of non beekeepers.

2) Using more experienced members to train recent newcomers and oversee the training.

3) IMPROVERS COURSE OF three or so full days for those who have been keeping bees for a year or two.  Each will be seasonal to include activities that need some input from the more experienced beekeepers we now have in our County.

There will be no charge to members for these courses.

Beekeeping has been growing rapidly in the Lancashire & the North West, with thriving branches in Liverpool, Southport and Ormskirk (which also covers the Wigan and Bolton areas).  Further afield there are branches in Preston, Blackburn and Manchester.

There are over 400 beekeepers in in the North West of England.

Bees are under threat from a variety of problems at the moment including poor summer weather and the parasitic mite Varroa.  

New beekeepers are given support and mentoring to take up beekeeping by local groups, as well as guidance in what equipment to buy and how to go about getting bees.


10 tips for the public on how to help honey bees can be downloaded from

http://www.britishbee.org.uk/news/bm~doc/ten-things-to-do-to-help-honey-bees-may-09.pdf