[Bonus] Short - Inside the Ohio State Beekeepers Association with Jamie Walters

[Bonus] Short - Inside the Ohio State Beekeepers Association with Jamie Walters

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Jeff Ott: Welcome to Beekeeping Today Podcast shorts. Your quick dive into the latest buzz in beekeeping.

Becky Masterman: In 20 minutes or less, we'll bring you one important story, keeping you informed and up to date.

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Jeff: Hey, everybody, I'm in Ohio, doing my walkabout, hitting all the great spots, and I'm here at the same time as the Ohio State Beekeepers Association is having their annual conference, and I have a great pleasure of being here. I'm sitting right now in the conference room with Jamie Walters, who is the OSBA President this year. Jamie, welcome to Beekeeping Today Podcast.

Jamie Walters: Thank you very much. I appreciate it. I'm a big fan of listening to the show.

Jeff: Oh, fantastic. We were talking earlier, and you have a great voice for radio. You have a background in--

Jamie: Back in the late '80s and '90s, we did 98.1 WMEE. I was the guy in the back that had the deep voice, and it carried on with a lot of different things, and then with master gardening and a lot of different stuff I got into. I got a voice that nobody can say, "I didn't hear that, or I don't know who that is."

Jeff: [laughs] "I've heard that voice."

Jamie: Yes. "I've heard that voice many times."

Jeff: That's fantastic. This is a great show, a great conference.

Jamie: Thank you.

Jeff: You have a lot of people here who are very excited about being here. I'm walking through the vendor area. They're walking around, just have that conference eye look of, "Wow, there's so much bee equipment right here."

Jamie: This year, we really pulled one off. I cannot do this. The president, I steer the ship. We had everybody, their expertise, this is the most-- we had 37 vendors this year. We pegged out the maximum capability with 280 people in here this year, with our staff, with all the staff from the board members to representatives, the volunteers, we really hit one out of the park this year with over 37 vendors. We were going to have one lunch period, and all of a sudden, we got to 260, and now we're having two lunch periods.

Jeff: Wow.

Jamie: Everybody was on board this year. We had the absolute best lineup of speakers that everybody-- and we took all the feedback from last year, and that's what evolved into this year. Friday, we had Dr. Tracy Farone and Mr. Frederick Dunn, and then we had three hands-on classes with a wax class that was making wax bowl wraps, where you put it in the fabric and bed the wax and make it into-

Jeff: Oh, nice.

Jamie: -a plate, or vegetables, and it really works. My wife makes hundreds of them. Delilah Walters is the one who made the wax bowl wraps, Roger Myers, out of the class, his part of the class was just rendering the wax from cutouts. We had Dr. Chia Lin from Ohio State do a dissection lab with 30 participants and 15 microscopes. They got to dissect a queen and a drone. Then we had a mead-making class, just not about talking about it, but they actually brought in their own honey and all the different things to make it different-tasting, and then actually walked out with a brewing mead by the time class was over.

We take the positive of it. We listen to all parts because there's always room for improvement. This year is probably-- I've been around OSBA now for 20 years, and this one we really, not to say I'm better than anybody else, but our board really pulled it together this year and had it kicking.

Jeff: You had a really good team working with you.

Jamie: Absolutely.

Jeff: That's fantastic. The mead-making class, that's something they can remember this conference in, what, six months, seven months or so?

Jamie: They'll have a nice brewing mead. That's why I told everybody, "Give me a call in six months when all this mead--" because some people had berry, some people had licorice.

Jeff: Wow.

Jamie: It's just something to try, and this is the type of thing with a conference where you get to come and see all these different speakers, get to listen to them, and it takes it from the area club, and it just increases it. You get a lot of other outreach with everything else.

Jeff: Let's go beyond that. What does it take to pull all this? How long ago did you start planning for this conference?

Jamie: This starts in December of each year. Our board gets all together from all the feedback surveys, from all the attendees, from all the vendors, and then we start in January. In January of 2026, we already have the venue, and then we take that venue and break it down to how many rooms we can have, what speakers we can have, if we want hands-on classes again, and then we meet every month, so Thursday at roughly 7:30 all the time. All the way through June, July, then we do our launch, and then we meet twice a month all the way up. Friday before we came, the Thursday night, we're doing that final checklist of extension cords and power strips and wax and who has this and who has that?

Every board members on every call this year, just by the attention of what we have and drawing attention, when I joined OSBA, there was roughly 80 to 100 people on the board. Now we're doing it with 20 people.

Jeff: Wow.

Jamie: Then in the last five to seven days, now we've had up to nine people that are interested in putting on the training wheels, if you will, and want to be a representative and wanting to help out. I see OSBA next year in 2026 and 2027 being even better yet.

Jeff: Being president of the OSBA, you probably have followed a very similar roller coaster as many local organizations and regional and state organizations in terms of memberships and ebb and flow, and COVID really decimated many clubs around the country.

Jamie: Oh, yes.

Jeff: How has OSBA responded to that, and how is OSBA working to increase the membership?

Jamie: The membership, it's quite crazy because before we were running between the-- or if you're a first-year beekeeper, you get to run and become a volunteer, or you get to run and get a complimentary one-year membership. Then we have our life members that pay once, and you're a life member the whole time. The volunteerism and everything took a hit with COVID, and then, for us, I wanted to reach out to every club.

The first year I was president, 2024, I think I visited 18 clubs. This year, I got to 21. It's wanting to know what the local resources need. OSBA's not the parent that tells everybody what to do, but how else can we act in this? We have the traveling speaker program, we have outreach, we have the OSBA honey judges. We do it as a resource to the clubs and then get feedback from the directors and representatives of their area of, "How else can we get help?"

We had clubs reach out to us and say, "We needed help on Gmail. How can we set this up for our club?" We did a course on that. One on Excel, one on graphics, one on social media, anything. We had a first and second part to how to do a basic PowerPoint with paid software or free software. We listen to what's going on in the region. That comes up, and then we turn around and advertise it for the clubs can, I want say, submit an event.

It's submit-an-event@ohiostatebeekeepers. They can send in their event or honey classes, a honey judging, a field day. Send it to OSBA, and then we have the media. The social with Facebook, roughly 10,000 to 20,000 people a month hit that. When they see that stuff going on in their area, and with every beekeeper, you can turn around and visit multiple clubs, so you see what's going on in your next county or the state, or another state's going on, and it's helping each other out at that county and state level.

Jeff: That's fantastic, and that's definitely needed with any organization, grassroots, if you will-

Jamie: Oh, absolutely.

Jeff: -at beekeeping and reaching out, and maximizing the strength of other organizations. That's really good.

Jamie: I've seen it. I was the president of the Master Gardeners in Defiance for years, and then we went from this gigantic volunteerism and everything, and then, all of a sudden, COVID hit, and it's a combination of things. It's a combination of life and family, and health. Then, all of a sudden, it's a new building afterwards because the beekeeping industry is not something where the young generation are into it, where all the clubs have the grants and things like that to help the young people get into it, because it is an expensive hobby.

It's an older gentleman's hobby. Now we see wives and husbands as teams. We see kids and mentors.

The best thing I tell everybody, we turn around and say, "This is what my bees are doing, but you have to look at your own microclimate, your own area." Then the best thing you do is hook up with a mentor that you can work with and say, "Hey, what am I learning?" Then read the books, go to the conferences, and get training beyond that.

Jeff: Now, you mentioned this, OSBA has a really strong drive towards mentorship.

Jamie: Oh, absolutely.

Jeff: You have a really strong mentorship program.

Jamie: We have a youth scholarship that we hook up with the local clubs, so that kid or that student that wanted to run and get into that grant or that youth, they can turn around, we hook them up with local clubs so they have a mentor. We hook them up with a virtual mentor. If that mentor is busy or other life circumstances, that student has somebody at OSBA to turn on and recommend to. Then we turn around and make sure they get the Honeybee Health Coalition book.

We look at the training videos and we talk to them about something that's going on in their area because it's hard when they say, "My bees are doing this," if we're not there, and then we hook them up with a local club so they can have another resource. Those are some of our best. We have one that Tom Rathbun has trained for years, and now she's a first-year student at OSU, and she's underneath Reed, and she'll probably be our next Jim, too, or Reed Johnson, and one of our next researchers.

Jeff: Dr. Reed Johnson, he's been a guest on the podcast, and he'll be a future guest, too.

Jamie: Good.

Jeff: Speaking of education, do you have an apprentice, and journeymen, and a master program within the Ohio State Beekeepers Association?

Jamie: We used to years ago. It fell apart because we didn't have a certified program, and with the administration, with OSBA, everybody rolls in and out. The volunteerism goes up in hours, and then you have people step away. Through health, or through life and health changes, that program dissolved, but we turned it over to OSU, and then we're working with Dr. Chia and Dr. Reed about making a certified online program.

They just launched the beginner program. I can get you some dates that you can advertise from Dr. Chia when that program launches. We did a pilot program last year where that was a certified program at your own pace, and learn about the basics of beekeeping. Then in May, they had a hands-on class. They're getting ready to launch it here in a couple of weeks.

Jeff: Oh, fantastic. Those are always so popular these days. Everybody learns online.

Jamie: Oh, absolutely. Yes.

Jeff: Everybody learns online.

Jamie: Then, you can work at your own pace, where you can go back and ask questions. You can work with your area resources and then look at your mentors and say, "Hey, I'm learning this, this, and this." It's got a lot of good book references. If they have questions, the Honeybee Democracy, The ABC, XYZ, so they can see the factual side of what it was in the past and how beekeeping has changed over the years.

Jeff: Beekeeping Today Podcast, for instance.

Jamie: Oh, absolutely.

Jeff: I'm sure it's on your reference list.

Jamie: Yes.

Jeff: And Honey Bee Obscura.

Jamie: Yes. It's on my phone. In fact, when I'm driving or anything else, it goes over my phone and my Bluetooth.

Jeff: Oh, fantastic. I'd like to hear that. You're in this role. You're going for elections here again, I heard in this morning's meeting. What do you have as recommendation for anybody looking to get involved in leadership in their-- let's focus on the state organization. Wanting to get into leadership or a position in their state organization, and even perhaps president of their state organization. What words of advice do you have?

Jamie: Words of advice. Work with-- and this goes for OSBA, Michigan, Indiana, any other state. Let the leadership know that you want to volunteer. Let them put the training wheels on you, learn the basics of what's going on, how the organization runs, what you need to do. Everybody has their own little niche. When you get up into the leadership, vice president, things like that, learn those different steps. Be willing to listen and learn, and then if you've got great ideas, take it to the board. If you've got the volunteerism and you've got the budget to do it, pull that off. When you get up to the leadership, for me, I say that I steer the ship with the majority.

If the majority says, "Hey, we're going to turn left and we want this program to do," that's your call. I never voted anything. I like to be open and listen to my mentors, my people, and then listen to the membership. We put out surveys all the time. We do Zoom calls. It's an open mic every first Sunday of the month. I've held that for the last two years. Anybody that has questions from the leadership from OSBA, "What should I be doing in my bees?" Anything like that, or "What's a good resource?" We have an open mic for an hour. Every person can have a three to five-minute conversation with us, and we answer those questions.

Being available to listen to people, because some people, it's not like putting out a fire, but they have a concern, and number one, you need to listen. No matter what size of that leadership you're at, listen to the concerns, put the facts back out to them, then I can refer you to a book. I can refer you to a podcast, or I can refer you to this and that, and then be humble enough that when you're wrong, you're wrong and you say you're wrong. Then, if you have an idea, you take it back to the board and say, "Hey, do we have the money, resources, and everything, and the people to do it?" Then move it on from there.

I've met some of the greatest people around. Rich Wieske is the president of Michigan right now. Next month, Michigan, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Virginia, and West Virginia, we're all going to get together, and we're talking about having a state where we're going to pull all the states together and have something in another location. I'll say that. Can't say it right now because we don't have everything ironed out. All the presidents are going to start talking every month because we're all in the same boat. Volunteerism, leadership. I visited 21 clubs, and all the clubs are in about the same position.

Someone's scared to step up, but if you put the training wheels on and you say, "Hey, you can be a representative, or you can be a volunteer," and help them, help them help themselves. All of a sudden, you find that they're absolutely great at doing something. Social media, newsletter, this and that. All of a sudden, they like something, and you really find those people. Other times, if they have to step away, family matter, or other stuff than that, then they need to step away, but 99 out of 10, they come right back to you and go, "Hey, I'm back from vacation or a family situation and I want to volunteer again."

You get some of your best people that if you've given them the opportunity to learn it, they'll turn around and just-- I wish everybody here on your podcast gets to see what was going on, but all the people for OSBA staff really stepped it up this year.

Jeff: They are everywhere and really on the game. They know what they're doing. You ask them a question, they know the answer. It's a great team that you've assembled, working with you.

Jamie: I'm happy. I'm very happy. Then, I talked with my wife, and she says, "You sign up for another two?" I said, "I'll sign up for another two." Then I turn them out and I said, "I'll always be with OSBA. I'll die having bees." I said, "I'm going to step back a little bit." I'll still help in the background, doing my thing with the IT, website, things like that, but I said, "I got a good team." I believe in it. I joined OSBA as a life member with my mentor, Dwight Wilson, right off the bat. Something I love.

Jeff: Jamie, I know you are running the show here. People are knocking on the door. You're shooing them away. I appreciate you taking the time out of your biggest day of the year to talk with us at Beekeeping TodayPodcast and the listeners. It's been totally my pleasure. Our pleasure.

Jamie: It's a pleasure to talk to you guys. Thank you very much.

Jeff: Thank you.

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