We Are the Owners/Beekeepers
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Shannon and Lydia are the owners/beekeepers of Sunken Boot Honey. Our mission is to foster a natural habitat for the production of honey and other bee products, and for the area's diverse wildlife.
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At the end of 2019, we began a native grass restoration project to return the land to the native prairie grasses and wildflowers. Unlike improved pasture grasses, native prairie grasses allow small prairie birds and mammals to construct micro-trails under the grass canopy, and travel and reproduce, all out of view of soaring hawks and other predators.
Our hives are registered with the Texas Apiary Inspection Services, which regulates the apiary industry in Texas.
Shannon and Lydia are participating in the Texas Master Beekeeper Program (TMBP), a voluntary educational program that aims to challenge a beekeeper’s knowledge of honey bees and beekeeping, by increasing the knowledge and skill level of participating beekeepers. The program is a five-year (minimum) beekeeper training program provided by the Texas Apiary Inspection Service in association with the Texas Beekeepers Association.
Shannon La Grave
BEEKEEPER/OWNER
My journey to beekeeping began when I was ten years old and found a hive the bees built in our family water-meter box. From that time on, I would put anything sweet out, so I could watch the bees come to taste it during the cold months of spring. In 2005, a local hobby beekeeper gave an educational talk. He let us try on a beekeeper’s suit, observe his hive, and sample honey. This lead me to join the Collin County Hobby Beekeepers Association (CCHBA). In 2007, CCHBA awarded me a youth scholarship, and I became an avid beekeeper.
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CCHBA named me Honey Princess, and then Honey Queen (2011 – 2013), so I traveled the State educating others about beekeeping, bee products, and cooking with honey. In 2014, TX Beekeepers Association named me Texas Honey Princess.
After a decade of beekeeping, I now mentor newbie beekeepers in the CCHBA. I designed the logo for Sunken Boot Honey, in which I am a co-owner of a local beekeeping business I have a passion for gardening, cooking, drawing and an intense love of the land.
The Land -- Sunken Boot
SUPPORTING BEES AND WILDLIFE
We are stewards of the land, implementing practices to promote healthy and sustaining populations of bees and wildlife. From March to August, Shannon and Lydia census the Blue Bird nest boxes and report the data to NestWatch, a citizen science project at Cornell University.
Bees are pollinators. "'Without pollinators, many of us would no longer be able to enjoy coffee, chocolate and apples, among many other foods that are part of our daily lives,'.... More than three-quarters of the world's food crops rely at least in part on pollination by insects and other animals.
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Birds are important pollinators too, dispersing seeds, and scavenging carcasses.
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At the end of 2019, we started a five-year native grass and wildflower restoration project to replace the hybrid grasses.
Lydia Brandt
BEEKEEPER/OWNER
In 2001, I purchased this property that had been neglected for many years. My goal was to manage and maintain healthy and sustaining populations of wintering and breeding songbirds, raptors, small mammals, aquatic and terrestrial herptiles and other wildlife. Having owned the property for more than a decade, each year I implement practices to achieve this goal.
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In 2017, as I segued into retirement, Shannon and I started Sunken Boot Honey, a beekeeping business for honey production and other bee products.
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At the end of 2019, we began a five-year native grass restoration project to remove the "improved pasture" grasses and return the land to native prairie. Unlike improved pasture grasses, native prairie grasses allow small prairie birds and mammals to construct micro-trails under the grass canopy, and travel and reproduce, all out of view of soaring hawks and other predators.