Sustainable beekeeping, chickens, and cake
One can never tell how many swarms there are going to be for any given season, and I was surprised to see so many people on the Association's list...swarms are deemed the sign of "failure" and bad management, yet here are tens of people wanting them to repopulate their apiaries after losing colonies over winter. … Continue reading Swaaaarms
It was a beautiful warm day on Wednesday, and I noticed an awful lot of bees flying around in my carport where I store all my hive equipment. I am checking the apiary twice a day for swarms at the moment and on my sweep back round, I saw this: I presume it came from … Continue reading First swarm!
Now that the bee commitments are starting to quieten down for the winter, I went to visit Paul to discuss plans for next year with the Market Wood bees, and any other swarms we capture from the feral colonies in and around Winchelsea. I have one of the swarms here at my apiary as we … Continue reading Winchelsea Visit
I received a phone call yesterday for someone who appeared to have a swarm in their conservatory: hundreds of bees, all crawling up the windows. They'd arrived that afternoon and the gentleman had rung pest control who said they'd be along in the morning to gas them (!) but thankfully the homeowners decided against that … Continue reading Honeybees? No, ivy bees
I collected a number of swarms this year, and probably a third of them have gone on to be viable colonies. I am pretty ruthless with swarms in that I leave them to their own devices: if they don't get going or the queen doesn't mate well, I don't throw a lot at them to … Continue reading Summer Swarms
I visited Knockhatch about 6 weeks ago, and the swarm we caught in the bait box from the Oak Tree colony were building up gradually in their hive, and bringing in lots of pollen. We went to check them again, and being hot, mid-morning, and during the school summer holidays, we thought it prudent to … Continue reading New bees at Knockhatch
I started working with the National Trust bees at Winchelsea when my friend and colleague Paul asked me to help remove some bees from a wall in a National trust cottage at Crutches Farm. We couldn't get them out so decided to leave them until they had built up again and were a bit more … Continue reading National Trust Bees on the Move
Today I went to visit the Knockhatch Adventure Park bees to see how they were getting on, and to check if any of the bait boxes were occupied. As I walked past on my way to the Wildlife Area, the bees in the oak tree were flying well in the sunshine: https://videopress.com/v/ZXw7aCEt The swarm we … Continue reading Knockhatch update
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…
The oak tree bees were very busy when we last visited Knockhatch Adventure Park, and according to the staff, the bees had swarmed on Wednesday 15th, but nobody had seen where they went. We checked our bait boxes: the one nearest the colony had bees! We weren't sure whether they were the swarm from the … Continue reading Knockhatch Swarm