Beekeepers Find Their Fix at Conference

One of the most attractive aspects of attending a Beekeeping Conference is the area where the vendors set up. Unlike almost any other hobby (gardening, stamp or coin collecting, camping, mountain climbing), beekeepers almost never have a store they can visit to see and touch and feel the items they may want to buy. There are stores, granted. But there aren’t many that carry most of the equipment and doodads we want. Plus, these stores, with even less frequency, carry those items that are cutting edge new. Generally, our only recourse is to vicariously visit a beekeeping business through the pages of their catalog. This isn’t bad, but it is less fulfilling than walking down the isles of a store, chatting with the owner about the various products and how to use them and other bits and pieces about beekeeping.

At a major conference, such as this first-ever National Beekeeper’s Conference, every major, and most not-quite major vendors are present with every thing they sell, and all of their brand new stuff to show off. Plus, those companies that have invented something, or have discovered something, or have a new idea are there too, showing off and trying to draw both customers and, for them more importantly, distributors. It is, without doubt the juiciest part of the meeting, and many beekeepers only go to the vendor area ... forgoing the meeting altogether.

Included this time are a few photos of some of these vendors and the equipment they are promoting. If the Gods permit, I’ll send along both photos and captions to explain what it is you are looking at, because you will never, ever see anything like this anywhere else, ever. For photos of smokers, honey containers old and new, and extractors small and super-sized, see my photo gallery.

Tomorrow the guts of the lectures start, and those in the know about Colony Collapse Disorder will again be telling us what they know, and what they want to find out. I did a quick and dirty survey today and the beekeeping population is pretty unimpressed with what’s been come up with so far ... Money, say the scientists. What for, say the beekeepers because there just aren’t that many crashing and burning this season.