Most here know Rick...

MIDDLESEX - About 40 barrels of honey and his off-site bee hives are all
that's left of Richard Drutchas' Bee-Haven Honey Farm, delivering a
tough blow to a sweet business that sends Vermont honey all around the
nation.

The Monday night fire that destroyed the barn and honey house at his
Putnamville home caused an estimated $100,000 worth of damage, Drutchas
estimated.

Drutchas, who was home at the time, said the fire began in the roughly
30-by-60 foot structure at around 6:30 p.m.. Drutchas said he built the
honey house addition onto the 100-year-old barn about three years ago,
to use for extracting and bottling honey.

Firefighters were able to save a second older barn and a connecting
structure from burning. Both Drutchas and fire officials have attributed
the fire to a faulty electrical source, possibly a honey heater or a new
lighting system in the honey house.

"I was heating up some honey, and it's funny because I've been heating
up honey up there for the past 20 years," Drutchas said on Tuesday.
"You'd think a breaker would have popped or something." For the whole
story...

http://www.timesargus.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051109/NEWS/51109
0362/1002


Kim Flottum
Editor, BeeCulture
623 West Liberty Street
Medina, Ohio  44256
V - 800.289.7668 Ext 3214
Fax - 330.725.5624
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