Living The Dream in North Devon
Even though I call myself a Beekeeper, bees are wild animals, all I do is provide them a home, protect them and keep them healthy.
I have kept bees for a number of years, in a suburbia and now the country suburbs in North Devon.
Well wouldn’t you bee angry too? I can see some of the beehives from the house. I am always keeping an eye on the hives checking all is well. In the summer it is always useful to look out at midday to make sure they are not swarming. Everyone had been warning us about...
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We are in full summer now, flowers blooming all over the place and the bees are busy. This glorious picture, nicely summarises some of the glorious flowers in bloom at the moment....
The lavender we have planted around the house is coming into flower. The bees are all over it. Honey bees and bumble bees, all going from bush to bush. Fantastic!...
Yesterday evening was glorious. Warm and sunny, the bees were still flying at 9:00pm! I took the opportunity to walk around the apiaries and feed some of the newly housed swarms....
Swarm season is upon us and it has been quite a busy year so far! Honey Bee Swarm Season is normally in the months of May to June, and this year there seems to be a lot of bees looking for new places to live. As a Bee Keeper and registered swarm collector (See...
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Just been to RHS Rosemoor. As always, beautiful gardens immaculately presented. As we walked in there were these fantastic wallflowers the scent drifting through the air. Even better, they were buzzing with bees....
I have a small confession to make, in a previous entry (Bees Gone) I thought my last hive had perished. Well good news! 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...
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This little honey bee shouldn’t bee out at the end of January. She should be warm and snug in her hive with her sisters! Probably popped out to go to the look and having a little rest before returning to the hive....
I’m gutted, think I have lost my last beehive. The bees seemed ok going into winter. They had plenty of food for winter, and the hive feels heavy suggesting there are still plenty of stores still in there. However, at this time of year, when you give the hive a sharp knock on the...
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Swarm Season is Upon Us Now that honey bee swarm season is officially here (read about the first swarm of the season here), we potentially have swarms to manage over the next couple of months and a bit of preparation to do. The swarming tendency can start about May, peaks in June, and begins...
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