Sustainable beekeeping, chickens, and cake
I am starting the sourdough courses this weekend, and have ordered some important and interesting flours to both try myself, and demonstrate to the bakers. Flour? Important? Interesting?? Seriously? Well, yes. I listened to a brilliant series of podcasts by Farmarama, where they discussed the grain used for baking bread, from growing, to harvesting, to … Continue reading Flour and friends
Back in August, I had the pleasure of hosting a photoshoot at my house for a publication called Primary Paper, the theme being "Environment". I had warned the photographer, Morgan Hill-Murphy that I had colonies dotted around in a natural setting rather than gangs of hives in rows, and that I wouldn't necessarily be able … Continue reading Primary Paper
I read a very interesting thing on Twitter this evening - I'm amazed to have found something noteworthy in amongst all the General Election mudslinging - from someone called Joe Ibbertson (@BizzleBugs) who I follow as he is also a treatment-free beekeeper: I think this is a really great summary. Consider this: a fundamental aspect … Continue reading Bees in winter
A couple of months ago, I went to a walk-and-talk at Tablehurst Farm about their poultry unit, and today I visited the dairy unit. It's a very small scale operation, and all the more charming for it. They sell their raw Jersey milk via a vending machine at the farm shop, where you can buy … Continue reading An Afternoon with Jersey Cows
Apparently this is a thing, created by the hashtag gods of social media. Still, I love a good sourdough and I get a few people asking about it so here is a quick post about the loaves I make. I have been using a rye starter for a number of years, although my most recent … Continue reading Sourdough September
Ok, so this is a bit of a departure, but it ties in with some thoughts and other discussions, so bear with me... Sustainable beekeeping to me is having hived bees in such a way that incorporates them in to the local area so that we can share the fruits of their labours, but not … Continue reading House Cat, and Sustainable Bees
We've had a beautiful couple of weeks here in Sussex, and I was wondering how my bees were doing. We have had a distinctly unbeautiful patch of weather during June and I was appalled to see on Twitter that many people's colonies had starved, having been caught short following the removal of a spring crop … Continue reading Apiary Update
Following on from my previous post... Yesterday I was contacted by a site worker from East Sussex Highways about removing the panel from the street lamp so that I could access the bees inside. We met underneath the lamp (although that's where the similarity with Narnia ends), and after a few deft stabs with a … Continue reading The Street Lamp Bees
On Sunday, I was called out to a swarm of bees who had decided to make their home in a lamppost. They were flying in and out of the access panel, and as they were in a residential area, and their flight path at small-child's-face level, I was concerned to get them out before pest … Continue reading Bees will be bees…
I am always keen to meet up with like-minded people, and I love using honeybees as a way of reconnecting people with our environment. I had a meeting last week with Vicky of Starnash Farmhouse B&B, and after coffee, walking and talking around the beautiful surroundings, it was obvious that it would be a perfect … Continue reading Starnash Farmhouse B&B…& Beekeeping