A Bee Blessing and Honey Harvest was held on July 8 at the First Presbyterian Church of Rutherford Manse, where Northeast NJ Beekeeper Jaimie Winters keeps her apiary in what is called the Peace and Love Garden. The Sunday school students plant and maintain the garden that bears tomatoes, raspberries, strawberries, peppers, cucumbers, sunflowers and herbs. Every July, church members and the community at large are invited to the blessing and to help with the early harvest, which has become a community-wide tradition. 

After the blessing by Reverend Pete Wilkinson, the community gets to work uncapping and spinning the honey, resting in between for a picnic of deviled eggs, cucumber sandwiches, fruit salad, bee cupcakes and lemonade. Kids head to the craft table to color in bee coloring books and make Tie-Dye t-shirts, or hang out at the bee station table with the observation hive learning about bees.

Northeast NJ Beekeeper members helped with this year's harvest. Attendees got a treat this year, as John Gaut, a master beekeeper, went into the hives and did a demonstration including a mite wash. They learned that the veroa mite is the bee's biggest threat. Gaut also passed around a frame of brood in which a baby bee was emerging.

After a long day of spinning, about 50 attendees got to take home the fruits of their labor -- a half-pound bear of Blessed Bee honey.

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