Rolla, Missouri -- Charlotte Ekker Wiggins in Bluebird Gardens, her one-acre limestone hillside apiary, Certified Wildlife Garden and Monarch Way Station.
MISSOURI BEEKEEPING INSTRUCTOR
GUIDE WINS PUBLISHING AWARD
ROLLA, Missouri June 5, 2021. A Missouri beekeeping instructor's beginning beekeeping guide has won a 2021 Independent Book Publisher's Bronze IPPY Award.
Charlotte Ekker Wiggins, Rolla, wrote and developed “A Beekeeper’s Diary Self-Guide to Beekeeping,” The 304 pages of information, check lists and photos help and guide beekeepers with their first beekeeping years.
The Independent Publisher Book Awards' bring increased recognition to the thousands of exemplary independent, university, and self-published titles published each year.
"A Beekeeper's Diary Self-Guide to Beekeeping" has been approved by Great Plains Master Beekeeping out of University of Nebraska as covering scientifically based best management practices. Wiggins is also a provisionally-certified Great Plains Master Beekeeper as the program gets established in Missouri. The Great Plains Master Beekeeping program started in Nebraska and now includes Missouri, Iowa, Wisconsin, Nebraska and Kansas.
Wiggins has been teaching beginning beekeeping classes since 2012, starting first at the request of her local Extension office. During those early annual beekeeping classes, she said she developed, and expanded, a diary that helped students with the decisions they have to make when they start keeping bees.
“It’s very exciting to take a beginning course and decide I think I can do this,” Wiggins said. “The reality hits once students get home and start asking themselves now what.”
The diary reinforces information new beekeepers receive in beginning beekeeping classes and guides them through the decisions they have to make to get started.
“Just finding the right place for the bee hives involves a sizable list of decisions,” Wiggins said. “The hive location check list makes that process easier to follow, contributes to better decision-making and hopefully ends up with hives full of bees that don’t fall over.”
The diary has places for documentation, an important skill for good beekeeping. “It’s easy to skip this step in the first year but by your second year you will be thankful that you have those records.”
If a new beekeeper can’t get to a beginning class, the diary will help fill that gap. “Although I encourage beginning beekeepers to take a class or two and find a nearby bee club, sometimes that can be challenging,” Wiggins said. “The diary will provide the key fundamentals for those beekeepers who don’t have ready access to clubs and classes.”
Wiggins has been a lifelong gardener and a beekeeper since 2010. A master gardener emeritus, in 2019 she was selected for a TEDx lecture on “why bugs matter” based on her one-acre limestone hillside garden and apiary. She was a contributing writer and master gardener representative on Missouri’s Master Pollinator Steward program, which launched in 2019 teaching the importance of pollinators to our food supply. In 2020, Wiggins was elected to Missourians for Monarchs, a collaborative of 150 federal and state agencies working together to grow more pollinator habitat. She also volunteers as Missouri State Beekeeping Association's partnership liaison.
She currently helps to manage a local bee club and in 2019 authored “Bee Club Basics,” a guide on how to start and manage a non-profit educational bee club.
© 2012-2021 Charlotte Ekker Wiggins LLC, all rights reserved.