Spring is in the air (at least for the Northern Hemisphere), so it’s a great time to think about our powerful pollinators! I had the pleasure of interviewing Jill Wickham, library volunteer and retired school librarian at the Milwaukee Waukesha Beekeepers Association (MWBA), for our featured library this month:
Who are you, and what is your mission—your “raison d’être”?
Our library is part of the Milwaukee Waukesha Beekeepers Association, a club in southeastern Wisconsin made up of beekeepers (beeks) and others who are interested in bees and beekeeping. The goal of our library is to support our members as they explore the hobby of beekeeping and expand their knowledge of beekeeping methods. We own roughly 100 books covering areas of interest to our members; the books can be checked out during our monthly meetings. Our books cover the subjects of honeybee biology, beekeeping in general, queen rearing, overwintering and treating bee colonies, producing and marketing honey, pollinator friendly gardening, crafting with beeswax, as well as a small collection of children’s titles about bees. Club dues support the periodic purchase of new titles.
Tell us some interesting things about how your library supports the community.
Our members are often asked to present to various community groups, and often use our library resources during these presentations. We also donate honey from our club beeyard—we maintain about 15 hives as a club—to our local Hunger Task Force food bank.
What a worthy cause, for the bees and for the food bank! Speaking of your library’s resources, what are some of your favorite items in your collection?
My favorite title to recommend is Hilary Kearney‘s Queenspotting, a book that is both fun and educational for all age groups. Also, two books by a Milwaukee author, Petra Ahnert, Beeswax Alchemy and Beehive Alchemy, which both contain DIY projects using beeswax, honey and propolis.
What’s a particular challenge your library experiences?
Our club members have varying degrees of experience and a variety of beekeeping philosophies. If you ask 10 beekeepers the same question, you’ll get 11 answers! So, it’s a challenge to provide materials covering all levels of interest, experience and philosophies.
What is your favorite thing about TinyCat, and what’s something you’d love to see implemented/developed?
I love how easy it is to add titles from LibraryThing and how visual our online TinyCat catalog is. I’d like to be able to add more than one copy to the same bib record, and I’d like to be able to generate emailed overdue notices right from TinyCat or LibraryThing.
Great feedback! While we don’t yet have copies management, we’ll be sure to announce any changes on that front. As for overdue notices, you can automate those from your Patron Email Reminder Settings at https://www.librarycat.org/admin/settings/circsettings. Hope this helps!
Want to learn more about MWBA? Visit their website at http://mwbeekeepers.org/, join their Facebook Group, or explore their full TinyCat collection here.
To read up on TinyCat’s previous Libraries of the Month, visit the TinyCat Post archive here.
Want to be considered for TinyCat’s Library of the Month? Send us a Tweet @TinyCat_lib or email Kristi at kristi@librarything.com.
