News Cobtree’s Elephant House is buzzing!

The Elephant House at Cobtree Manor Park has a new tenant, Arms Apiaries. After housing elephants for 25 years as part of Maidstone Zoo, up until 1959, it will now be home to beekeeper Jason’s new business venture.

Jason Arms has been keeping bees for five years, with 35 honeybee colonies spread across seven different apiaries located in Kent, from Detling to Hadlow.

Arms Apiaries specialises in the safe and ethical removal of established honeybee colonies from residential and commercial properties, covering Kent, Surrey, Sussex and Essex.

Part of the unusual building will be used for honey processing and dealing with all the beeswax collected from properties.

Jason said:

“The Elephant house is an ideal size for this expansion. I call it ‘The Hive at the Elephant House’ as this is now my hive of operation for the business.

“From here I will be extracting all the honey my honeybees produce and jarring it, also rendering down all the beeswax collected to make natural beeswax candles.”

The park is managed by the Cobtree Manor Estate Trust, in partnership with Maidstone Borough Council (MBC). Cllr Simon Wales, Chairman of Cobtree Manor Estate Charity Committee said:

“I can’t wait to visit this great new addition to Cobtree Manor Park, it will be wonderful to see the old elephant house in use again and with such an interesting new tenant.”

The other part of the Elephant House has been turned into an area to run beekeeping experiences.

Jason continues:

“I will be running my beekeeping experiences from here too, for people to learn all about these amazing insects, wearing protective suits they will open honeybee colonies.

“Hopefully in the future, it would be great to have groups of school children along to learn about bees.”

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