sustainable beekeeping and wildlife gardening
It's the shortest day today, and the weather has been calm and cool. Rain is forecast for the rest of the week (including, obviously, the Christmas weekend) so I wanted to go and check on the Thermosolar hives while it was at least dry, if a little cold for the bees to be flying. A …
Continue reading "Winter Solstice and the Thermosolar hives"
I wanted to pop in and check the inspection boards of the Thermosolar hives to monitor the mite numbers, and generally make sure all was well. It was a cool day but there was some sunshine so I hoped the bees would be flying. https://videopress.com/v/uKhpxIBe?resizeToParent=true&cover=true&preloadContent=metadata Sure enough, the second hive was active, with bees steadily …
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 …
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 …
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 …
A glorious day, and the daisies have popped up almost overnight! Great to see such a swathe of these: they are not only good pollinator plants but also provide some nice tall cover for mammals. The blackthorn has gone over now, as has much of the hawthorn but this late spring does mean the traditional …
I was called out to a swarm (thanks Georgia!) at Arlington Reservoir yesterday evening: handy as I needed a swarm for the vacant Thermosolar hive about 500 yards away as the bee flies - in fact I did think there was a possibility that they could be a swarm from the occupied Thermosolar. The other …
At last: some Spring-like weather! Lots of swarms around so I had planned my day to visit the Thermosolar bees remarkably well. They were looking bonny - here's a slo-mo: https://videopress.com/v/qPLzPAur?preloadContent=metadata I didn't do a particularly invasive check as there were people on site and the bees aren't the friendliest colony, so I checked the …
It's been really cold - down to freezing overnight - but I was aware the Thermosolar hive is very well insulated and the bees might be needing more room as the cold may not have checked their progress in the way that other hives would. Bees need to expend a lot of energy keeping their …
The Thermosolar hives at Berwick are based on a standard National hive, but with some modifications. I have a video below showing the basic organisation and construction: https://youtu.be/INQ-1wzutWE The Thermosolar ceiling is only used during mite treatment hence why I just have the roof at the moment. The occupied hive was flying well considering how …
Wayward Bee 