AUBURN — Visiting outdoor educator Grace Kenney will offer her presentation on The Birds and the Bees at the next Androscoggin Beekeepers meeting on March 8.

The meeting will be held in the vestry of the West Auburn Congregational Church, 811 West Auburn Road, Auburn. Club business will be conducted from 6:30 to 7 p.m., followed by the presentation. 

Kenney, originally from North Haven, Connecticut, first arrived in Lewiston-Auburn as a student at Bates College. There, she pursued a degree in environmental studies and a minor in geology, greatly enjoying her schoolwork and appreciating all the chances it gave her to play and learn in the great outdoors.

She returned to southern Connecticut after graduation and began working full time for a small-scale commercial beekeeper. What began as an internship the summer before her senior year offered the unique opportunity to dive head-on into the world of honeybees — lots of honeybees. With roughly four hundred hives to tend to amidst ever-changing seasons, it seems as though there is always more to learn in the life of a beekeeper.

Kenney has also begun a new endeavor as an environmental educator for the Connecticut Audubon Society, teaching outdoor, hands-on programs to school groups, scout troops, and other visitors to the center in Glastonbury.

In her presentation humorously named The Birds and the Bees, Kenney will take that famous saying a little more literally than usual. Discussing her transition from college life to working for a commercial beekeeping business and then the Connecticut Audubon Society all in just one year, Grace reflects on her experiences and the core values she has brought from one phase of life to another.

The Androscoggin Beekeepers meetings are the second Wednesday of each month from September to May, with hive openings during the warm months. At 6:30 p.m. will be a brief business meeting and informal sharing on what is happening in hives, followed by a program at 7 p.m., which usually lasts an hour.

All meetings are held in the vestry building of the West Auburn Congregational Church, 811 West Auburn Road, Auburn.

FMI: androscogginbeekeepers.org

Grace Kenney performs a hive inspection. She will speak to the Androscoggin Beekeepers on March 8.

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