Home is Where the Honey Is
Fri, Oct 1, 2010
Teri and I were lucky enough to tour Doris and Donald Mech’s Maple Valley apiary this summer. The Mechs have been selling their honey at Pike Place Market since 1974, making them our most senior farm permit.
Doris’s broad smile can be seen behind North Arcade tables 11/12 on most Saturdays, although she is admittedly slowing down and scaling down her operation as she edges into retirement. The Mechs have been bee keeping since 1973. Prior to that Doris was a school teacher and Donald was an electrical engineer at Boeing. One day Donald read an article about a beekeeper in Kent and was intrigued enough to visit him and learn more.
Becoming Market farmers profoundly changed the Mech’s lives, in a way that will resonate with most (Daystall) readers. Donald, an avid outdoorsman, once climbed Mt. Mckinley. As Doris says, “Don used to go camping with the bees. When you are a bee keeper you have to do things around the bees. You cannot go climb a mountain during honey season; you’ve got to be dedicated to the bees. We came to appreciate being in the wild by being with the bees.”
Inside their cozy farm house a pillow is embroidered with, “Home is where the honey is.” From their dining room window, framed by bustling bird feeders, the view looks down hill to Doris’s expansive garden and the meadow beyond where the hives are located. A wall of forest provides a backdrop that masks the distant highway.
Inside the vast outbuilding (which they built) are all the essential components of honey production: the extractors, the stacks and stacks of hive boxes, boxes of jars and packaging. The scale of their facility is indicative of the earlier years when the Mechs engaged in a higher level of production.
At their peak, the Mechs kept 200-250 hives placing 5-6 truckloads at various pollination sites. As with all farmers the year-to-year yields vary based on many variables, with the average annual yield for this region being about 40 pounds of honey per hive. Currently they manage just 10 hives.
When asked what sage advice she has for the up and coming Daystaller, Doris replied, “You’ve just got to stick with it and do your best. You have good years and bad years, but you have to appreciate what a focal point Pike Place Market is. Make a good product and people will come to you, they will seek you out.”
And with a chuckle she adds, “And don’t make any enemies.”
- David Dickinson
