Today has probably been the first chilly morning, the temperature is beginning to turn. However, it is dry and sunny, so a chance to gather in some of the nuts.
We have a small young nut orchard with cultivated varieties. Primarily, hazel nuts, but also walnuts and sweet chestnuts.
Before Mr & Mrs Squirrel take my hazel nuts, I thought I would get in there first and pick them.
The walnuts and chestnuts aren’t quite ready yet, so will leave them for another day.
This year I have had a varying crop of apples. The Cooking apples aren’t as abundant as normal, but I have some cracking eaters.
These Fiesta apples are really tasty and soooo juicy! A real prize apple!
We are having some warm weather at the moment. The sunny warm days are great for the bees allowing them to get out and about to build up their winter stores. Caught this lady foraging on a flowering ‘Iceberg’ (Sedumspectabile ) plant.
I have a two acre field, I really want to turn into (revert to?) wildflower meadow. How do you do it? Can anyone help?
It seems really complicated and expensive.
Done the research over a few years and got the facts, just spent £40 on seed! (mixture of perennial and annual from Pictorial Meadows #PictorialMeadows) only does 10 square metres. 2 acres is equivalent to 8,000 square metres …… so at a price of £32,000 …. not really achievable????
A lot of money, but it needs to be done right, so hopefully this autumn we will get started. I then just need to work out how to do it affordably over the next 5 years ….. yes a 5 year project ….
#RHSGardensRosemoor have stared a wild flower meadow, and it is looking good. They are just down the road, if they are reading, perhaps someone could help out, after all we are members. I could pay in honey, vegetables or fruit ….. but I suppose that is coals to Newcastle???
Anyone any thoughts on how we can do this in an environmental way, for little cost, to achieve a native meadow.
A very quick inspection the other evening, showed that the swarm collected a month ago has a queen that appears to be laying well.
Since the swarm was collected, they have been creating comb to store honey and pollen in as well as provide the queen a place to lay eggs for the next generation of bees.
I have been regularly checking the new colony to ensure that they are healthy and have no visible signs of disease. There is always the chance, when collecting a swarm of bees, that they bring back a disease to the quarantine apiary such as EFB (European Foul Brood) or AFB (American Foul Brood), both of which are contagious, and notifiable to DEFRA.
The new colony is looking very healthy and the queen seems to be laying healthily producing eggs and brood (bee larvae)
The RHS Rosemoor Rose Festival was glorious. The roses were all out in bloom and their sweet scent wafted through the warm summer air.
Even though the blowsy colourful blooms thickly clustered with petals looked magnificent, it wass the simple open single rose flowers that attracted the attention of the bees.
This is always the way, the double blooms may look glorious to us, but simplicity is beauty to the bees.
Today I collected my second swarm this week from the Bideford, North Devon.
A large swarm collected yesterday in a plum tree and was still present today, so I nipped along at 12:00 and picked it up.
It’s now located in my quarantine apiary, ready to be put in a hive tomorrow.
When collecting swarms, people, often ask me: “what happens next”?
I’ve decided to write about this swarm, so that anyone who is interested can track it’s progress. Check back to my website for updates: www.ChilcottsFarm.co.uk/news/ or follow the tag #BidefordHoneyBeeSwarm on Instagram.
I have just collected this nice little swarm of Honey Bees from a building site in Barnstaple.
I got a call from the Site Manager. The bees had been clustering underneath some scaffolding since yesterday. Conveniently located at ground level, I put them in a box and brought them back to our isolation apiary.
Remember, if you have a Honey Bee Swarm that needs collecting and the swarm is in the local area of Bickington or Fremington, contact me. My details are below, or go to my webpage: https://chilcottsfarm.co.uk/bees/local-swarm-collector/ to find out more and to check it is a Honey Bee Swarm.
Contact me if you have a Honey Bee Swarm that you need removing:
Telephone: 07403 311920
Or, email me using the form below:
If I am not available, or you need a Swarm Collector for another area, please go to the British Beekeepers website and put in your post code: https://www.bbka.org.uk/swarm This will provide a list of Honey Bee Swarm Collectors near to you.
If you have had a Honey Bee Swarm collected and wish to make a voluntary donation toward expenses, please complete the form below:
A couple of weeks ago I noticed a couple of bees flying from the hive and returning with pollen. It looked like cherry blossom pollen, perhaps from the blackthorn that had started to flower in the hedge rows.
Anyway, the last couple of days, which have been very warm and bright, the bees have been flying and coming back with loads of pollen. In addition, the cherry and plum blossom in the orchard is covered in bees.
Hopefully the weather will remain kind to the bees, and this year’s fruit trees will be well pollenated and produce a bumper harvest of fruit.
This is a meal in-itself. Soft boiled goose egg. Boiled to perfection, soft white, and creamy yolk.
This is how we did it:
