A packed audience came to hear Master Beekeepers Brenda Kiessling, Tim McMahon and Barry Thompson answer pre-submitted and on-the-spot questions at our March meeting. To start, each of them defined “Master Beekeeper” and explained what interests them most about keeping bees. Moderator Pam Hepp kept the Q & A flowing, moving from questions about “in the hive” topics such as preventing swarms, using nucs, splitting hives, handling queens, storing frames, replacing old drawn comb, maintaining hives, and strategies for controlling varroa mites. Then we moved on to wide-ranging, “out of the hive” topics such as flow hives, the business of beekeeping, and what lies ahead for bees and their keepers.

They each brought years of experience, successes and mistakes to their answers and those of us in attendance would have been happy to stay for a couple more hours of questions.