Bee City - Field Trip

This post is overdo.... and written some time ago.  But I never posted it.  Obviously, from the wording, it was written prior to us moving.  However, I decided to post it and leave my wording and comments the same... So here it is - my post on our field trip to Bee City and review on it...

Our family tries to go on a field trip at least once a month.  With a move coming up quickly, we tried to get even more field trips into our schedule.  One place the children kept requesting was Bee City, located in Cottageville SC.  We had been there a number of times, and the kids really enjoy it.  Bee City has three main parts, including the HoneyBee Farm, the Petting Zoo, and the Nature Center.

The Honey Bee Farm is, I think, my favorite part of Bee City.  Here they give students a class on the benefits of bees via a video.  The children can see a live hive, as well as make beeswax melts into various shapes, pour honey into their own bear shaped container, and/or roll sheets of beeswax into two candles.  Their raw honey is yummy!!!  It is one of our favorite places to purchase honey, as well as wax for various crafts.

The second part of Bee City is the Petting Zoo.  Not all animals there can you pet, but many of them you can.  This area seemingly has grown over the years... with animals though, not space.  This is my least favorite part!!!  The animals just do not have enough room, and sadly it seems like it is more about making the "almighty dollar" opposed to educating about the animals, as most zoos are focused.  I was pretty disappointed with this area,  and had therefore considered not writing this post at all.  I finally decided that my blog is about real life... both good and bad...  Here are some pictures of the animals we saw there. (Picture Heavy!)

African Serval Cat

Cavy

The third part is the Nature Center.  My children LOVE this portion.  This time, there was a gentleman in there that spent quite a bit of time talking with the children about the specimen, as well as letting them hold a few.

So would I recommend Bee City?  I guess it depends on why you are going!  Are you going for the purpose of seeing various animals?  Then no, I wouldn't.  Instead I would recommend the Riverbank Zoo in Columbia.  However, if you are desiring to learn about bees, and have the children do hands-on activities centering around them, then yes, at this point in time, I would.  Will we be going back?  No.  I'll be searching for a beekeeper instead!