Photo by Terry Georgia
Interior view of the Foursquare Gospel Church on Mountain Avenue, which continues to deal with an infestation of honeybees (and now bats), is holding a yard sale to help raise funds to safely move the critters out.

By Terry Georgia
The Surveyor

Fresh off the Memorial Day removal of 40 to 70 thousand bees from inside the walls of Berthoud’s historic Foursquare Gospel Church, members of the congregation have discovered yet another, larger, hive behind a different wall — in addition to a large colony of bats living in the attic. Church member Tom Leston discovered that dozens of neighborhood bats were actually coming from inside the church after he acquired a pair of infrared binoculars and spotted them flying out from under the building’s roofline at night.

With the costs to remove both the bees and the bats increasing, the small congregation is holding a yard sale to help offset the expenses of relocating the environmentally valuable critters to new homes, away from the church.

The yard sale will be held on Saturday, July 8 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. in the yard directly behind the church at Mountain Avenue and Fourth Street. The sale is open to the public.

The church is also asking for donated items from the larger Berthoud community to add to the items the church plans to sell. Donations can be brought to the church early on the day of the sale.

Watch the Surveyor for updates on the status of the bee and bat removals, as well as the story of the on-again/off-again restoration plans for this historic centerpiece of Berthoud architecture.