Bee-utiful time at Spring Garden Workshop
Tue, 03/31/2020 - 3:29pm
admin
By:
Bernis Ingvaldson
Approximately 32 gardeners attended the 2nd annual Bagley Spring Garden Workshop on Saturday, March 14.
Connie Nunemaker’s started the afternoon off with a presentation on tips and techniques for increasing the plants in your yard and garden for little or no cost. From transplanting (lawful/unprotected) wildflowers and trees to starting from seed, many ways exist to start plants inexpensively. Also, make friends with another gardener who needs to thin out their plants, or join a garden club!
An interesting Q&A session followed with great participation from the audience. Followed by a break for refreshments where many enjoyed visiting and purchasing succulents from vendor Jolene Schmitz, kids colored and planted various seeds into little pots to take home and watch grow.
The afternoon wound up with hobby beekeeper Tyrone Moen from Blackduck capturing the audience’s attention with show and tell items including a demo hive, tools and gear, wax and honey products, along with accompanying facts about the amazing life cycle of honeybees.
Just a few bits of trivia as follows: It take visits to two million flowers to make one pound of honey. One bee makes 1/12 tsp honey in its lifetime and can fly 15 mph. A queen bee can produce up to 2500 eggs per day which translates to one egg per 35 sec. Willows are great pollen producers first thing in spring, and bees appreciate asparagus and broccoli blossoms later in summer. Other favorite blossoms include dandelion, raspberry, basswood, clover, milkweed, and goldenrod. Alfalfa needs bees for pollenization but can make bees ornery as it has a flap on the blossom that slaps the bees in the rear end as they leave. Bees will will go after pretty much any single blossom flower including herbs. 97 percent of visitors to apple blossoms are bees, 40 percent of visitors to cucumbers are bees. Remember that bees are directly necessary for one out of every three bites you take. Tyrone sells products in the summer at the Blackduck Farmers Market on Wednesdays and at special events. He says his goal is to make enough money to pay for the expenses of his four hives.