My father, Norman Walsh, who has died aged 83, won the world cup at the National Honey Show twice with his bell heather honey, from the bees he transported into the Mourne mountains of Northern Ireland on a custom-built wheelbarrow.
Although he had passed his preliminary exam in beekeeping in 1953, this interest had to take a back seat while he pursued his education and a career with Unilever. When he retired in 1989, he took up beekeeping in earnest, competing, teaching, judging and travelling with his wife, Rosemary, to Apimondia, beekeeping’s international convention. He was certified as a lecturer in apiculture in 1996 and a honey judge in 2003. He was appointed MBE in 2008 for services to beekeeping in Northern Ireland.
Each year he introduced about 30 new beekeepers to his passion, running the preliminary courses in Dromore, Co Down, and lecturing at the annual summer school of the Federation of Irish Beekeepers Associations in Gormanston, Co Meath.
He built a particularly strong relationship with Ukrainian beekeepers, although it started badly when they objected to his disqualifying their president’s honey at Apimondia Ireland. He explained why and taught them via email how to compete to the highest standards. They swept the boards at the next Honey Show in London and he was invited to Ukraine with Rosemary as an honoured guest. He subsequently helped Ukraine in a successful bid to host Apimondia 2013.
When he was awarded his MBE, typically Norman made the Queen laugh at the investiture by replying to her question about the problem of varroa, a pest to honeybees, by suggesting the research could be better funded by HM government.
He was born near Dromore, son of Rowland, a schoolteacher, and his wife, Etta (nee Culbert), who had run a photographic business before her marriage. After Methodist College Belfast and Greenmount Agricultural College, he won a scholarship to study agriculture at Queen’s University, Belfast, and on graduating joined the animal feeds firm BOCM, part of Unilever.
Norman was a small man with a big sense of honour, humour and civic duty. He believed in religious freedom and fairness. He was a member of Kirk Session and treasurer of Hillsborough Presbyterian church for more than 20 years and served as convenor on several of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland’s committees. He was president of the Grain Trade Association of NI and of the Ulster Beekeepers, and chair of governors of Downshire school in Hillsborough, Co Down.
He is survived by Rosemary (nee Cairns), whom he married in 1959, and their three children, Gilbert, Fiona and me, six grandchildren, Katy, Sophie, Pádraig, Caitlín, Jason and Lee, and a great-grandson, Arthur.