September Monthly Meeting

SOBA monthly meetings are open to the public.  

Due to a schedule conflict, the September meeting will take place at the Rogue River Library in the Community Meeting Room. The address is 412 E. Main St in Rogue River, OR. Due to these circumstances, the election of officers will take place at the October meeting. 

The building is open at 5:00PM and some attendees bring a meal to eat onsite, or bring potluck to share. This is an informal time to socialize and engage with experienced beekeepers. 

The main meeting begins at 6:00pm with a presentation by Jan Lohman of Project Apis M.  There have been several chapters in Jan’s life prior to becoming a commercial beekeeper; beginning with building and teaching pottery for a Blue Mountain College, then owning and operating a bookstore, Hermiston Book Company in Eastern Oregon for fifteen years. She began beekeeping in 1991 as partner to Vincent Vazza at Vazza Farms where they ran 2500 colonies, pollinating almonds in California, and cherries, pears, blueberries, melons, vegetable seed crops and buckwheat in the Pacific Northwest, until their retirement in 2017. They missed bees and their associations with beekeepers, so in 2019 began a sideliner outfit with a semi load of bees for five more years before getting out of pollination completely in 2023.

Jan has been part of the Oregon State Beekeepers Association Board for over 25 years, as President for three years, Secretary for four years and currently as Grant and Foundation Chair. She also has been part of the Oregon Master Beekeeper Program since inception as an advisor, teaching a beekeeping class in Eastern Oregon and mentoring hobby beekeepers, and is still currently serving on the Oregon Master Beekeeper advisory committee, and on the executive board for Save the Bee.

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