Willowherb. One of my favourite plants, and at the moment it’s exploding with great swathes of candy floss seedheads, although most of them have been harnessed with gossamer like the willow twig and agrimony here: I heard the twittering of Goldfinches as I walked along, so they are presumably enjoying the seeds. The Cuckoo Trail is one of the few places I see Greenfinches this … Continue reading The Fluff of Dreams
I am very fond of ivy bees, and I’ve a few big clumps of the plant in my garden and in places I walk past with the dog, so as soon as I hear they are out and about, I start scrutinising the flowers for this charming little species. As with many solitary bees, they often emerge en masse making the name ‘solitary’ seem contradictory. … Continue reading On the hunt for Ivy Bees
Another beautiful day at Berwick, visiting the Thermosolar hives, part of the Solar Bee Project. I didn’t check inside the hives as by this time of year, the bees are sealing any gaps with propolis and need to focus on collecting nectar and pollen to provision the hive for winter. In any case, I much prefer a more observational method and by looking at the … Continue reading Thermosolar Hives in Autumn
I thought I would get ahead of the game and purchase some seeds before I actually need them, but while I still have a sporting chance of actually getting hold of some. I went to Seed Co-operative and decided to pick some bee-bird-human friendly seeds in my bid to increase natural food for my wildlife. This article shows how – once again – our desire … Continue reading Sowing Seeds
I started my beekeeping journey back in 2009, when following a particularly interesting module of my Natural Sciences degree with the Open University, I learnt about superorganisms and eusociality, aka colonial insects. I realised that it was possible to keep one’s very own social insects – honey bees! – but I quickly became confused and disillusioned by the instructions I was given for looking after … Continue reading Unsustainable Beekeeping
The bees have been rather challenged by the weather this year and my hives have seemingly plateaued after a slow start. Dealing with hot, cold, wind and wet needs resilient bees, and I was interested to see how the Thermosolar bees did this year. The site looks great. I love this sort of unmanaged management and it shows what happens when you actually just leave … Continue reading Thermosolar High Summer Update
I recently featured on the Living Being podcast, talking about my involvement with schools and honey bees. You can listen to it here, or it’s over on my Patreon as a public post. If you’d like me to talk to your school, or be on your podcast, please email me. Continue reading School Beekeeping Podcast
I’ve been away for a week, and come back to find the Verbascum in full flow. It’s a great plant, and bees and hoverflies love the tall spikes of exquisite little flowers. The buddleia is also in flower, as are the evening primrose – currently full of pollen beetles. I have masses of bindweed all over the garden, and I have always had a fondness … Continue reading Summer Garden
It was a rather murky day for my visit to the Thermosolar bees, but the meadow areas were brimming with bees and butterflies. Marbled White, Meadow Brown, a couple of Small Skippers were flitting above the flowers and grasses, joined by a variety of bees and flies. There were also numerous banded snails which looked extremely pretty against the daisies. I walked through the thigh-high … Continue reading Meadow flowers and the Thermosolar hives
In a previous post, I wrote how I was feeling chuffed that I had managed to pick two females from a batch of unsexed ducklings. Hmm. I was using the beak colour identification which is apparently pretty failsafe…for ducklings under 3 days old. The yellow/pink beaks of the females and dark grey beaks of the males swap over after a while, so pale beaks in … Continue reading Drakes
