How Sweet It Is!
Friends House’s Reach Goes Beyond The Campus Here:
As a 10-year-old, Marion Story was mesmerized by the hypnotic hum made by the honeybees in her father’s hives. Some 50 years later, she herself took up beekeeping. But when she moved to a townhouse in Olney nine years ago, the HOA there prohibited beekeeping. Fortunately, some time later, through the grapevine, Marion learned that the beekeeper at Friends House was retiring. So she stepped up and offered to work her hives here. Before long, Friends House residents joined in and began helping her out.
“I am so thankful to have a place to pursue beekeeping and to have gotten to know, and enjoy working with, many people in this community,” she says.
These days, Marion remains fascinated by the bees. Take the honeycomb, for instance: “It is constructed by thousands of female (worker) bees all laboring together, A worker bee toils tirelessly her entire lifetime, producing just 1/12th of a teaspoon of honey. These female bees are literally working themselves to death,” Marion explains.
She adds that “being a beekeeper has made me aware of how dependent we all are on insects for survival and how interconnected all animals and plants are.”
Recently, with the help of volunteers, Marion harvested about 125 pounds of honey. She donated the net proceeds from the honey’s sale, totaling $1,500, to Friends House! Thank you, Marion!
