Pemi-Baker Beekeepers' Association 2026 bee school

ASHLAND — The 2026 Pemi-Baker Beginner Bee School gets underway on March 14 at the Ashland Booster Club, 99 Main St. It will be held on Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. through April 5.

Participants will learn how to keep a colony of bees, promote their health and extract their honey. Also explored will be the bee's essential role in pollinating plants from flowers to vegetable gardens to commercial crops.

To be discussed at the school are bee biology, equipment and supplies, hive components, how to buy and install honeybees, hive management, products from the hive, pests and diseases and protecting hives from bears and other potential intruders.

The course is designed to allow a beginner to be able to successfully keep a hive. Mentors are available to provide ongoing assistance as needed.

Gerard Godville, with more than 20 years of experience in keeping bees, will teach the class with the help of club members and guest speakers. He and his wife, Mary-Ellen, have been coordinating the school since it began in 2010.

"I enjoy seeing new people get into trying to keep bees and helping them and mentoring them through the process of raising bees," he said.

Godville finds it rewarding to teach people about the importance of bees to the environment, given their instrumental role in pollinating plants of all types, including food crops.

One thing people may not realize, he said, is that keeping bees is part science but it is also an art, with various beekeepers having differing approaches and techniques.

"As the old cliché goes, ‘You can ask a question to five different beekeepers and get six different answers,’" he said. “But the idea is to keep the bees healthy, get them through the winter and keep them going."

Those who take the course become members of the Pemi-Baker Beekeepers Association, a club with monthly meetings.

The nonprofit organization has more than 100 members from the Lakes Region, the North Country and throughout the Northeast.

Registration forms and other details can be found at pemibakerba.org/bee-school-2026-registration.

Any inquiries can be sent to Mary-Ellen Godville at megrg74@yahoo.com.