Bee keeper Mrs M. Lennard gave us a most interesting talk on Bee keeping which is not as simple as it sounds.  She explained that hive bees are only wild bees that live in a hive.  They need honeycomb to store their honey, this is made of wax which bee keepers recycle to avoid the bees expending all their time creating it and therefore more of their energies go into actually producing honey.

Each hive has a Queen Bee who is larger than the other bees.  She does nothing for herself, only lives for three years but after she mates can produce 1500 eggs per day (the male drone dies after mating). The bees will only accept one Queen in the hive and if others are born they are killed.

The bees fly out to forage and can go as far as three miles.  They are clever enough to be attracted back to their own hive by its own scent which is originated from their Queen. In the autumn the drones are thrown out as the bees will not feed them over winter when food is in short supply. They also gather propolis (a resinous substance collected from the buds of trees) to make the entry to the hive smaller preventing other bees entering their hive for food.......So much activity to produce a jar of honey.  No wonder is expensive to buy.

The December meeting on the 10^th December when Mr Barrett-Lennard will lecture on South African Spring.

The AGM smoothly passed all reports and happily re elected committee and officers. We had regretfully due to esoteric rules to lose our stalwart committee members Mary Williams and our long standing and hardworking Secretary Susan Holmes. Into the breach have stepped Joanna Manches as Secretary and Rob Overington.

The evening concluded with a fact filled lecture 'Surreys last Wilderness', on our heathlands, their Geology, history, geography and fauna, diminution and restoration by Rob McGibbon

The last sale in 2007 on  Saturday 1^st December at the URC Hall 10 am - 12 noon.

When you buy Traidcraft fair-traded goods you are helping to improve the life of a family who do not want charity but the chance to work their own way out of poverty.