46 people in attendance; 43 in-person and 3 online

Updates from the President – Nathan

  • Welcome new people!
  • Tip – If you have a Hive IQ, check it because they build up quickly and they might be ready to swarm already!
  • We just finished up an apprenticeship class – the last part of that class with be a trip to the apiary Friday 4/25 in the evening to install a couple nucs and a package – anyone from the Fall class is also welcome
  • Apiary is coming along – built hive stands, storage shed and shipping container with donated equipment
    • Will be having our picnic there this summer
    • Looking to have about 14 hives out there pretty soon
  • Applied for next round of Inspire Olympia funds that we will use to build an indoor greenhouse done space at the apiary for our classes and meetings
  • TC Fair coming up – we will be selling honey, if any members want to sell their honey at the Bee Booth
  • Be Swarmed – New method (website tool) for reporting swarms and finding out about swarms to catch
    • We signed up as an association and now all our members have a lifetime membership
    • OBA members can get the code from our website to sign up for the service under our account
    • When someone reports a swarm meeting your parameters, you get a text instantly and can claim it and catch it
    • Will add a note and link to the intro video in the Beeline
    • We will add a widget to our website that allows people to report swarms from there
    • Should promote that we catch swarms to fire departments and pest companies
    • The more people who sign up the more we’ll promote it to the community

Vice President – Bryan

  • Working on getting hives going at the club apiary at the Freedom Farmers
  • We got new signs and cameras to go up at the apiary for security reasons and some branding out there for us

Outreach Coordinator – Mohan

  • McKinney Elementary visit in the next week – need to borrow someone’s bees to take along – Bryan can put some club bees in the observation hive
  • Mohan also takes care of the Google discussions group – one of the ways Bryan will confirm when he’s gathering folks at the apiary

Membership – Kristina

  • 116 members as of tonight

Treasurer – David

  • Financials are looking really good, just got another infusion of grant money
  • Looking to establish a Venmo account for the club in the future
  • Looking for volunteers to take over the Treasurer position at the beginning of 2026

Education – Gail

  • We just completed a very successful apprentice class
  • Planning for another one in the Fall
  • Apprenticeship is required to get a club mentor
  • If you have requested a mentor and they reach out to you, please respond to them! If you haven’t heard from your mentor, reach back out to David Hughes, Mentorship chair.

Librarian – Lynn

  • We’re getting a new librarian!

Speaker tonight: Jordan Bramwell is teaching us about queer rearing!