Updates from around the club:
Wildlife Habitat Enhancements and Operation Pollinator:
We have finally gotten our bee hives installed in the recently re-seeded wildflower bed near hole #27 and power line. As you may recall from previous videos and blog updates from the past several years, we have been expanding our environmental enhancement programs/projects around the club. The projects include native bird box installations (we recently added 2 more wood duck boxes after last years amazing 11 egg hatch of wood ducks!) These hives are part of our partnership with several groups and agencies aimed at increasing the diversity of wildlife habitat around our property. We have so far partnered with Native Bird Boxes of Florida for our bird boxes, Syngenta and their program "Operation Pollinator" which provides wildflower seeds, program signage and support as well as Audubon Society and one of their programs "Monarchs in the Rough" (Look for butterfly houses soon!) they also provide wildflower seeds, signage and support.
Now that the hives are in place we hope to harvest around 60 lbs. of raw honey from these hives in the next year or so. This honey will be available at the Club. You may not know but the woods and grounds all around the park play host to several natural hives located throughout the park. Unfortunately we do not have the ability to harvest the honey from them as most are located in hollowed out trees or in other inaccessible areas. Not the case with these hives, as they are located in the middle of our wildflower bed and that will allow our bee keeper to extract the honey during harvest time. The bee keeper we are using is Florida Registered and is an expert in the Operation Pollinator program that we are part of.
After years of work we are very excited to finally have our hives in place.
Please be sure to stay outside the boundary area of the bed/hive (stay outside the signs) so as not to disturb the bees. PLEASE DO NOT LET YOUR PETS IN THE AREA. We get several reports each week from golfers and residents alike about pet owners allowing their dogs to run freely along power line.
Here are some images of the replanting of the pine trees:
