Largest Award Winning Honey Show In North America At The Topsfield Fair
The largest Award Winning Honey Show in North America takes place every year at the Topsfield Fair. The show is put on by the Essex County Beekeepers Association and a tremendous amount of work goes into preparing for it all year long. Numerous awards and prizes are given out for everything from jars of honey to beeswax candles to photos to honey cooking and more. Anyone can compete as the competition is open to all. During the fair the club also sells honey and beeswax products from club members, has educational exhibits and programs about bees, multiple observation hives and even a beeswax candle rolling station. All these exhibits are held at the beekeeping building on the fairgrounds. If you are local and have not been to the fair yet it is definitely worth a trip out there, especially for bee lovers. The fair runs from September 28th – October 8th, 2012 and it is the best place to get delicious raw local honey for a great price.
During the fair the bee building is always filled with people. Beekeeper volunteers work there to share their knowledge about bees with the public. Here are a few photos of the fair in action. The first picture is of Marty Jessel, a beekeeper who is manning one of many observation hives at the fair.
The candle rolling table is a favorite of kids and grown ups alike! Beekeeper Suzanne Brown and her son Nathaniel are helping children roll some candles at the fair.
The honey selling counter is always busy!
I entered a few exhibits in the Honey Show at the fair this year including an Educational Exhibit, B&W and Color Photos, the cooking challenge recipe and several categories of Beeswax Candles. Here are some of the entries I submitted.
My color and black and white photos both won first place.
Some of you may recognize the picture below as the color version can be seen in my post Installing Package Bees in Dandelion Hive.
I also did fairly well in candles. My pair of decorated candles placed first.
And my two pairs of rolled candles in one color and two or more colors placed second behind Eric Josephson, the local award winning candle maker. Here are the single color candles.
And here are the two pairs of multicolored candles.
My educational exhibit also came in second place. It was about How To Plant A Bee Friendly Garden.
Here are a few close up pictures of my Educational Exhibit. Click on a picture to open the gallery and click on the arrows to scroll through the photos. If you click on the picture the gallery will close. If you are reading this in an email or a reader and the gallery does not display properly, please click on the post to view the gallery on the website.
My favorite exhibit was made out of beeswax by Junior Exhibitor Grace Neale and showcased the Olympics. Check it out!
Here are a few pictures I took before the fair opened of the some of the honey show entries and awards. There are so many entries that I could not get them all so you will have to go to the bee house in person to see them. This first gallery shows photos of the honey entries in the honey show.
This second gallery showcases photos of the beeswax entries in the honey show.
The last gallery displays photos of the “other” entries in the honey show which includes educational displays, photos, arts & crafts, cooking and more!
I hope to see you at the fair!
Other Posts You May Enjoy:
- Raspberry Honey Jelly Recipe
- Raw Local Honey For Sale at the Topsfield Fair Bee House
- Picking Up The Package Bees
- Planting A Bee Friendly Garden
This post was shared on the Down Home Blog Hop.