This honey bee was making the most of the late September sunshine. The colour of its pollen load suggests it had decided to target the dahlias. It managed to get a good all-over dusting too.
Tag: Honey Bees
BEES GOING ABOUT THEIR BUSINESS (1)
A SELECTION OF SUMMER BEES IN DORSET
This is a small selection of bees visiting a Dorset garden during the last month or so. The favoured flowers have been Hyssop, Lavender, Alium and Cosmos. And if anyone knows the name of the pale bee in photo #4, I’d be pleased to know – it’s a real beauty.
A POPULAR POPPY WITH SMALL BEES Romneya coulteri
TREE POPPY Romneya coulteri
This plant at Oxburgh Hall, Norfolk was a magnet for small bees. We watched them come and go, filling up their little saddlebags. Photos of bees in flight don’t often work well. These are no exception. Still, they do catch the general bizzyness of the proceedings. The plant was lovely, not one we knew. Another new bee plant find for the year, along with Hyssop.
“HONEY RUSH” – LAST ORDERS IN THE SEASON’S FLORAL SALOON
The bees are working overtime as a chill spreads over September and winter downtime looms for them. So busy are they that there is competition for individual flowers – even though there are more than enough to go round. Bumbles were out in force yesterday, and there are still butterflies around, mainly tiny Small Coppers and Whites of different sizes.
We’ve done a quick assessment of plant popularity this spring and summer that produces this league table:
- Hyssop – the runaway winner for bees of many types, ditto butterflies and (new entry) moths. Planted for the first time in May, and has effortlessly thrived (throve? thriven?) to become Nectar Central.
- Lavender – perennial success with bees and butterflies. More planted this spring and very well visited.
- Cosmos – new to the garden this year, a fast and easy grower, and hugely popular with bees, especially bumbles. Also visited by honey bees and butterflies, but only on their way the the hyssop.
Blurry, I know, but the intruder arrived from nowhere as I pressed the button… Why it didn’t land on one of several vacant flowers next to this one, I have no idea. Maybe fighting drunk on pollen?
DORSET BEES, WILD HONEY & A RED SUNSET
GETTING TO GRIPS WITH A CANTERBURY BELL
IF THE CAP FITS…
WHAT ARE THESE ‘HOVER-WASP’ GUYS CALLED?
I only noticed the gleaming gold thorax after downloading the photos
WILD BEES IN A WOODPECKER NEST BOX, ABACO, BAHAMAS
This year we had West Indian Woodpeckers using 2 nest boxes under the eaves.This successfully diverts them from drilling into the woodwork of the building. They raised two families this season, with 3 chicks fledging each time. Another nest box on a tree in the drive was not to their liking, and was quickly colonised by wild bees. The nearest small apiary – there are only two I know of on an island 120 miles long – is 15 miles away. These bees will never have known the luxury of a hive. I doubt they’d need or want it…
I photographed this sunset from our garden in Dorset a couple of evenings ago. In reality it was more dark pink than red, but by simply zooming directly at it the colour was altered dramatically. The second image is a simple crop of another photo taken seconds later, as the banding became clearer as the sun sunk below the horizon. It looks more like a planet. [NB No P/shop]
DON’T WORRY. BEE HAPPY…
A strange yellow disc appeared intermittently in the sky today. It is warmer. Time to venture into the garden. First stop – the lupins. Bees in residence? Check. Looking closely, I notice that they part the individual pods with their legs to get at the contents. There’s certainly bags of what they are after, to judge by the leg pouches.
Next stop: the nice pink flowers that are called… well, if someone wants to remind me, please use the comment box. They came from a nice house in Kent and have flourished on my regime of benign neglect.
Now that blue thing – Canterbury Bell, is it? Bee inside? Tick.
The foxgloves seem popular with the bumbles today. Only the purple ones, not the white ones. Such pretty patterns close-up, and such long hairs inside. The technical term for these is… forgettable.
GOOD GRIEF! When I pressed the ‘publish’ button, this turned out to be my 100th post on this ramshackle, poorly curated website. Thanks to the select, small (but slightly increasing) numbers who turn up to have a look from time to time. This isn’t my main project, but it’s a place to put a few nice pics from time to time. Merci, all. RH
TO BEE OR NOT TO BEE: “A TASTE OF HONEY…”
TO BEE OR NOT TO BEE: “A TASTE OF HONEY…”
The London Wildlife Trust has several small urban nature reserves close to the centre of the city. The Camley Street Natural Park was created in the early ‘8os on the site of a derelict coal yard, sandwiched between rail tracks and a canal. The site had become naturally colonised by plants over the years, and the small strip of land was preserved as a wildlife haven near the very heart of London
URBAN BEES runs beekeeping taster courses at Camley Street. We went there last weekend to taste the taster course, which is run by Brian McCallum and Alison Benjamin. Both are very experienced beekeepers, and the joint authors of 3 excellent books (two of which I already owned, but I had dimly failed to link the authors with the course leaders). More details of the books are at the end of this post. The early morning had seen inauspicious dark clouds and very heavy rain in London. Slowly it began to clear, and by mid-morning the skies were blue and the sun shone brightly.
By 11.00, 20 of us had been welcomed to the lecture room by Brian and Alison, and we all settled down in learning mode. It quickly became clear that Brian’s relaxed yet sparky presentation would be (a) informative and (b) entertaining. And so it proved. We covered the ground quickly: bee varieties and their place in the world and in the hive; the caste system; bee anatomy; the birth and life cycles of bees; the basic hive structure; first steps to keeping bees; the pros and cons of keeping urban bees; the equipment needed and the (considerable) costs involved; and varroa.
Brian presented the information clearly, with occasional interventions from Alison. They made an instructive double act. Time for a break and a practical demo, so we all trooped out into the fresh cold air and sunshine to visit the hives at the far end of the Park. This involved threading our way alongside the canal and past wild and picturesque ponds.
At the ponds, youngsters (with adults!) were encouraged to use small nets to scoop out water and weed and inspect the contents. The rattle of the trains on the tracks into St Pancras barely seemed to intrude on this surprisingly pastoral strip of land. 
Beyond the ponds were our targets – real hives with real bees. But would they be showing themselves in January? The team marched on to find out.
And suddenly there they were. HIVES! BEES! And active, too (at least in the 3 hives actually in the sun) 
Brian was kind enough to demonstrate his own “waggle dance” (joking – he was saying “some grow this big…”)
With the hive lid removed, we were able to view the hive through perspex. Brian showed us some winter food for the bees. I lost track a bit here – as the tallest person in the party, my head was slightly above the Park fence, and I became aware that it was on some bee ley-line direct from forage to hive… Minor avoiding action was called for (bent knees).
Under the hive was a tray designed to catch varroa mites in particular. The number on the tray is a good indication of the health of the hive. Although Varroa has only been around in the UK for about 30 years, surprisingly there are now no hives completely clear of infestation. So varroa mite control is a matter of limitation, not eradication.
On this tray, we were clearly able to see a number of mites amongst the other debris – tiny shiny creatures capable of wiping out an entire hive if left unchecked
Having completed the outdoor practical stage, we wandered back to a sustaining lunch, before the afternoon session
After lunch Brian dismantled a hive for us, explaining the structure and the purposes of each part. We entered the technical arena of frames, brood-boxes, supers and nukes. We learnt about identifying the queen; and swarming and how to control it (in theory). Any ‘beeks’ reading this (you perhaps, Miss Apis Mellifera?) may be chuckling at the naivety of all this. Please smile benignly – we all have to start somewhere… By the end of the hive demonstration, interwoven with much of the bee material we had learnt about in the morning, we felt we had had a very thorough and clear introduction to the world of bees and beekeeping.
Brian and Alison posed some big questions. Why do you think you want to keep bees in the City? Might you be better finding a beekeeper you can help while you get some experience first? Do you believe you will make a living out of it – honey money? (Short answer – there’s no way you ever will). Are you trying to save bees from extinction? And if so, have you considered other ways to achieve this, not just for honey bees but for all bees. Planting bee-friendly flowers and plants is a good way to achieve this, or becoming involved in bee-related groups and projects locally.
For our part, we left feeling we had had an excellent day’s course, with information imparted thoroughly but in an easily assimilable way. And we both agreed that we will not be buying a hive, bees, a spacesuit and a smoker. Instead we will add some more bee-friendly plants to our garden, doing our bit that way – and buying local honey (very good as it happens) rather than the bland honey blends that come to us from halfway round the world. (Oh, and the mystic ingredient of Manuka honey that makes it 3 or 4 times more expensive than any other? Marketing skill, apparently…)
Plate 70, from Volume 2: A History Of The Earth And Animated Nature by Oliver Goldsmith, 1852
I bought the lovely original plate above 2 or 3 years ago for around £10 (there’s one on eBay now for about £11, though not in very good condition). It is featured on page 11 of one of Brian and Alison’s books. Which brings me to Brian and Alison’s joint-authored bibliography. Of the 3 books shown below, I would recommend the first for anyone looking for a well thought out and well illustrated introduction to beekeeping in all its aspects. All can be found on Amazon, ABE and other such places. Or contact the authors with this link URBAN BEES
Keeping Bees and Making Honey
A World Without Bees
Bees in the City
Finally, two recommended websites of active bee-keepers who describe the day-to-day reality of keeping bees, meeting the ‘twin imposters’ along the way and treating them just the same. Also included are details of the beekeepers exams, to challenge the the more experienced beekeeper.
Pride? Ambition? Frustration? What’s going on here?
And is there any room for honey-based music and humour? There surely is…
[youtube http://youtu.be/BTuOAPE-LOo]
AUTUMN BEES AT CLIVEDEN
AUTUMN BEES AT CLIVEDEN
[I seem to have loaded pics at too high a resolution, so these seem weirdly squished and distorted. They looked fine on the plant, and they look fine if you click on the image…]
A DEFINITION OF IRONY – OR FRUSTRATION
OCTOBER BEES FEASTING ON FUCHSIA, LATE AFTERNOON
I don’t feel I quite nailed this motion shot! But it sort of works. In a way.
ROLLING HARBOUR GALLERY 