Executive Meeting (May 2020)

Minutes

Attending: Bill F, Cindy P, Carolyn H, Nicole S, Simon L, Don L

Not Present: Kazlyn B

• Bill began the meeting at 7:07pm.Reviewed agenda.
• Review of last week’s general meeting.
  • Delighted with 46 attendees.
  • Surprised we filled 1h30min window.
  • A lot going on.
  • Need to improve poll – question versus list of answers. Swiping on screen didn’t seem to work
    for Simon.
  • Breakout chat at end might be worth trying. Not sure how that would work.
  • Bill could not see all panelists. Cindy suggests it may be possible to scroll through list.
  • Positive feelings on flower quiz.
  • Don’s video worked well
• What to do for June?
  • Beginners corner (20 mins?)
  • Intermediate corner (20 mins) – may still be interesting for beginners.
  • Bob L may not be available for intermediate corner. Others will have to field the questions.
  • Can we have list of questions before meeting?
  • Need something on front page of website with meeting link. Similar link needed for Facebook page.
  • Can we use the “raise your hand”?
  • Do we want someone like our traditional speaker?
  • June was going to be the Strawberry social.
  • Were we using Q&A or chat for questions? Believe participants were limited to
    Q&A.
  • Zoom was interfering with audio in Don’s video due attempt to filter out buzz of bees.
  • Idea for speaker: Jerry Rozema? Computers hooked up to hives? Bill to try and track him down.
  • Woodworking project?
  • What is an outyard?
    • Bill and Brad to go up on Saturday.
    • Could come back with video.
    • Logistics.
• Online draw for tags at meeting.
  • Need to provide interest in advance.
  • Looking at existing 3 sites and potentially changing one.
  • Send email specifically about tag draw entry.
  • Email in advance to express interest in up to 3 plus interest in extra if left over.
  • Pickup tags at church.
• Idea for future meeting – beekeeping bloopers.
• Suggestions for website
  • Swarm line needs to be easier to find.
  • Is buy/sell section easy enough to find?
  • Seems well encoded for search engine to present links for swarm, buy/sell, etc., but not as obvious for someone visiting the website.
  • Annual membership link is quite far down the list. Should be higher.
  • Club swarm registration was not clear that you have to specifically request your apiary location on the club map.
    • Club member home addresses are on the map. One icon type.
    • Club members may request other locations be on the map. Second icon type.
    • Former club members remain on the map “greyed out” for a period of time.
  • Website access
    • Werner could put password lock on certain areas such as extractor rental. Password changed periodically.
    • Contact information should be put behind password barrier.
    • Ability to post on buy/sell is members only.
    • Hive hosting, regional groups, behind barrier.
• Saanich Fair
  • Going to try and do something online.
  • Fair itself will not happen.
  • Cindy to liaise with Irene T regarding what we can do.
• Executive meeting minutes to Attendees and missing executive for review before posting.
• Additional topics
  • Mites (Don wants more focus)
  • Nosema testing (Jean Manville offers service.)Don working toward getting a microscope. Don may have a setup for testing once we get back to meetings.
  • Mentors
    • There is a box for members to indicate they are interested having a mentor (or be a mentor?)
    • Carolyn indicated we used to have mentor list, but history is there are more people wanting a mentor than those willing to be mentors. Small groups was supposed to help with this.
    • Carolyn looking to see if we can have an online meeting of small (regional) groups.
    • Don indicates being a mentor can be very time consuming.
• Meeting adjourned 8:23pm.