Community, Education, Communication - A Buzz-Worthy Story

Apiarist. That's our Word of the Day.

Bethpage State Park, home of the world-renowned Bethpage Black, hosted a workshop on May 2, 2017, connecting the Long Island Beekeepers Club with Cornell Cooperative Extension Nassau County's Gardening program .

We got to participate in the workshop and tour the property, and we have got a total of a good 5% of the 1,500 acres covered after three hours of mini caravan. The tour stopped at popular educational hot spots such as:

Vic's Valley, where Bethpage's Director of Agronomy Andrew Wilson, and his staff horticulturist Vic transformed a previous junkyard and dumpsite into a pollinator garden.

"When we first started the project, we have pulled out old tires, shopping carts, and even an old stop sign'." said Wilson.

But now this parcel of land right next to the Black course is so full of life your ears and eyes won't even be able to catch up identifying the songs or flights of the birds all around you.

You could also see the red-and-green beehives in the back, which were started 3 years ago with only 4 boxes.

The Greenhouse, where Vic collects and propagates native plants for use throughout the park, along with some carnivorous plants for his (and really, the rest of the staff's) curiosity because, well, who doesn't like cool carnivorous plants?

Horticulturist Vic describing the process of harvesting seeds from previous year's crop. (Click on the picture to listen to Vic explain!)

The Wildlife Garden, where we were warned to look out for the over-protective red-winged blackbird. The Wildlife Garden is right next to the 12th tee of the Green Course, and it is also home for swallows, bluebirds, and hundreds of different pollinators.

Note: Yes, we know. No parents are overprotective.

The video featured here is of Moira and Grace, who take care of the bees on Bethpage, explaining how honey is made. More and more beekeepers, or apiarists, will go to golf courses and keep their bees there. Understanding the benefits of these bees and being a good steward of land as golf course superintendents often are, golf courses are usually happy to oblige these tenants as well.

We cannot thank Bethpage State Park enough for having us there, and more importantly, we cannot thank all the good people that we met today enough to keep making this a better world.

Thank you.

We will keep telling your stories.

#bee #golf #Bethpage #sustainability #stewardship #pollinators