Bees, education arrive at King's Cold Creek Conservation Area

Newly started honeybee colonies moved into Cold Creek May 11

Yorkregion.com
June 13, 2023
Simone Joseph

Bees are coming to Cold Creek Conservation Area.

The Township of King has partnered with local beekeeper Andre Flys of Nobleton to feature a local apiary at the Cold Creek Conservation Area in King.

An apiary is a place where bees are kept or where a collection of beehives are kept.

“Our planet relies on bees to pollinate 75 per cent of the world’s flowering plants,” Mayor Steve Pellegrini said. “As a Bee City, King contributes to protecting pollinators by enhancing existing habitats and creating new habitats for pollinators in parks, gardens and naturalized areas.”

A Bee City is part of a North American movement to support pollinator protection. A pollinator is anything that helps carry pollen from the male part of the flower to the female part of the same or another flower. The movement of pollen must occur for the plant to become fertilized and produce fruits, seeds and young plants. Bee City communities support collaboration and establish and maintain healthy pollinator habitat.

King is committed to conserving and enhancing pollinator and monarch habitat through native wildflower plantings, wildflower and milkweed seed giveaways, educational workshops, citizen science monitoring, programming and nature-based education.

The goal of the partnership with Flys, owner and manager of Pioneer Brand Honey, was to offer an apiary on site, including educational workshops and learning opportunities in partnership with an experienced local beekeeper.

Flys has bees throughout King and works with a variety of landowners in the township and beyond.

He moved the newly started honeybee colonies into Cold Creek on May 11. The Cold Creek apiary is situated off the South Connector trail. Cold Creek has a bee observation outlook station on site that trail users can access to observe the apiary from a safe distance.

King is offering a Beginner Beekeeping Workshop on July 23 and an apiary guided tour on Aug. 6. More information is available at king.ca/environmentalstewardship.

The beginner workshop will be a full-day, hands-on workshop offering virtually the same course taught by the Ontario Beekeepers Association Technology Transfer Program, said Flys.

“The guided apiary tours will be a 1.5-hour ‘meet-the-beekeeper’ experience where I will open up a colony of bees at Cold Creek and explain what we see inside while looking to identify the queen. It promises to be an informative program,” Flys said.

Go to the following links for more information: coldcreek.ca, pioneerbrand.ca or king.ca/BeeCityCertification