{"id":11174,"date":"2012-09-28T09:18:10","date_gmt":"2012-09-28T08:18:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.alananna.co.uk\/blog\/?p=11174"},"modified":"2012-09-24T13:35:27","modified_gmt":"2012-09-24T12:35:27","slug":"skep-making","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.alananna.co.uk\/blog\/2012\/09\/skep-making\/","title":{"rendered":"Skep Making"},"content":{"rendered":"

We’ve had a busy beekeeping time lately. What with our honey extraction<\/a>, a visit to the National Beekeeping Centre<\/a>, the ABKA Photo competition<\/a> and now we’ve had a chance to try our hand at some traditional beekeeping craftsmanship – We attended a Skep Making Workshop with the Aberystwyth Beekeepers Association.<\/p>\n

As with most of the ABKA events this was a fairly informal affair and we went along for a bit of fun, a\u00a0social and to see if we could get to grips with skep making. Ann and Helen were running the workshop, having already made a few skeps between them, but I’m sure they’ll be the first to admit that this was no master-class!<\/p>\n

After the obligatory tea and cake, Ann and Helen introduced us to the tools and materials needed. There isn’t much really, some straw, some binder, a guide (made from a plastic drinks bottle in our case) and a bodkin. And we were off. It took us a little while to get to grips with it, but things did start to fall into place fairly quickly and by lunch time we had the\u00a0beginnings of a skep. Some\u00a0of the other skpes were a little more advanced than ours, but we’ll get there in the end, although it will take a while to finish it.<\/p>\n

We\u00a0couldn’t stay all day though as we had to recce a night hike for the scouts so we left a little early, but as usual we had a good time and it was nice to see some of the ABKA members, have a chat and of course eat cake and drink tea.<\/p>\n

Oh, and in case you didn’t know, a Skep is a straw container that traditional beekeepers used to house their bee colonies in. They are now useful receptacles for catching swarms.<\/p>\n\n\t\t