sustainable beekeeping ∙ baking ∙ chickens ∙ wildlife
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 …
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 …
It was brisk and breezy despite the sunshine at the Berwick site today, so I was wondering if the bees would be flying. I've not been to check on them since the autumn, so I was keeping my fingers crossed for signs of life at the Thermosolar hive. I watched carefully and sure enough: foragers …
Just a brief visit to the hive this time as I knew the small one was queenless, and the other hive needed its empty super taken off now they've cleaned it up. It was a beautiful day and the bees were very calm. They have a lot of Varroa so I need to perform a …
I collected a swarm from another beekeeper a few days ago, and as they were a prime swarm (by all accounts) and are managed, but not treated for Varroa, I thought they would work well down at the solar farm in the Thermosolar hive. I took them down to the site the following evening, so …
Thankfully, it is perfectly possible to continue to care for honey bees while still respecting the social distancing/essential travel restrictions, and this hot weather and abundance of flowering trees has meant all the bees have been extremely busy. I have combined all my contractual visits in to one 'Bee Tour', hence the sudden crop of …
Wayward Bee 