The County association (of which Kidderminster BKA is one of the seven branches) is an active participant in four shows which take place each year at the Three Counties Showground in Malvern,

Countrytastic

The RHS Malvern Spring Festival

The Royal Three Counties Show

The Malvern Autumn Show

The shows inform and educate the public, promote beekeeping and offer members the opportunity to sell their honey. All these shows take a lot of organising which for many years has been done largely by one person, who has ultimately decided he needs to take a well-earned rest. That means we need people to take over, otherwise we’ll not be able to take part in the shows at all. It might turn out that we’re not able to do all of them straight away, but we need to look at which shows we think are important and do what we can to Save (at least some of) Our Shows. The County President, Martyn Cracknell, is going to draft a paper which outlines what we need to do: watch this space!

Members are welcome to advertise beekeeping items for sale and wanted here. Please send the details along with the contact telephone numbers and e‑mail address you want to be used to the Editor. Entries will usually expire after one month but may be renewed on request.

The Asian hornet Vespa velutina, an invasive species, was found in England for the first time in 2016 with confirmed sightings every year since; nests were found in Portsmouth and Ascot in 2021 and in Essex in 2022, and numerous nests were found in Kent, Dorset, Devon and East Sussex in 2023.

What does it look like? What should you do if you spot one? Find out here.

The Asian Hornet Watch smartphone app (announced in this article on GOV.UK) was launched to help everyone identify the Asian hornet and report sightings. It is available free of charge from the Apple and Android app stores.

Links to Asian-hornet-related articles around the Web (more will be added from time to time)

a blog which is a good summary: https://chiswickcalendar.co.uk/a-bit-of-a-hornets-nest/

BBC: The bees learning to fight off invasive hornets

The branch has a small collection of books about bees, beekeeping and related matters which have always been available to members to borrow. To borrow a book, read the article here.