Sustainable beekeeping, chickens, and cake
I have had a colony at my apiary which was occupying a brood box full of comb we'd taken out of a feral nest in a wall at Crutches Farm in Winchelsea (see post here). The comb had been piled in and robbed out, but we'd discovered bees bringing in pollen, so moved them over … Continue reading Post mortem number three…
Back in May, I visited the bees at Knockhatch Adventure Park, and there had been a small cast swarm in the bait box. We'd put this in a National, and kept an eye on them. I had last checked them from the outside at the end of August, and they had been bringing in pollen … Continue reading Another post mortem…
It is always really important to conduct a post-mortem on any hive losses, as it's a vital part of our learning curve with beekeeping. Sadly in many circles, losing hive is regarded as a "failure" which, if you are observing and watching and monitoring your bees rather than working towards a homogenised collection of colonies, … Continue reading Hive post-mortem
Today's weather was finally good enough for us to visit the bees on Langney Marsh. We also wanted to see if our tarp experiment had vanished in the floods, so Paul and I headed down under blue skies and a brisk and chilly breeze to see what was going on in the apiary. We saw … Continue reading Marsh bees, and Bee Lining