Leaf Cutter Bee

Fascinating behaviour from this little bee today- looks remarkably like a honey bee, the leaf cutter is a solitary bee. She kept returning to the same spot with her piece of leaf. We couldn't see where she was making her home though!

Honey At Last!!

On Saturday we inspected all 3 hive at Waxwings, Jill and Rob donned the suits and joined us. The hive we had moved- now W3- looked good, brood in all stages and plenty of stores. The move did not seem to have done any harm and they have settled well on the new site. We put a super on as there were bees on 10 frames in the brood box and the forage at the moment looks fine.
The other 2 hives were also looking great, especially W1 which had a super added last week- and today there was honey being stored on 5 frames, very satisfying!!

Rebecca phoned to tell me that she had spoken to beekeepers in Portsmouth at an Eco event- there they were having similar problems to Notts Beekeepers in that they had more swarming than normal, colonies that appeared queenless and also worries that the nectar flow had been badly affected by the dry weather.

Cherry Clafoutis

With a crop of about 3 and a half kilos of cherries this year I have looked for recipes to use them, as well as enjoying them as they come- they must be one of my favourite fruits! Clafoutis is an old favourite and this year I used a recipe from the Nigel Slater book-Tender 2. This book is excellent, organised in sections for each fruit alphabetically!
His recipe wasn't so different from others I have tried, it was delicious warm with a little drizzle of maple syrup.

Summer Fruit

I have not been able to get to the allotment in about a week- our youngest daughter had her 30th birthday this weekend so we had a great visit to Portsmouth to see the family and have lots of cake!!!
However the summer fruits have been cropping beautifully- the cherry tree in the garden has the biggest crop so far- have the bees made a difference to pollination? There have been strawberries for about 3 weeks now and yesterday Trev came home with raspberries and tayberries.


The broad beans are cropping and Trev made a lovely broad bean and bacon salad to go with the salad leaves for tea, alongside his homemade stilton and walnut rolls- what a treasure!!




Today's haul!

 

Moving Hives

We have been uncertain whether the two hives in the garden had laying queens for a while, but had already decided that we would like to move one of them to Waxwings. We decided the Newark hive was the one so about a week ago we inspected and prepared the hive for moving. Another new beekeeping experience! It became obvious as the inspection began that we did have a laying queen in this hive- we didn't see her, but there were very small larvae and lots of egg on the frames. As we were only going to be in the car for about 20 minutes we decided that with the open mesh floor there would be enough ventilation so we put 2 straps each way round the hive and left them until later in the day.
Bees have to be moved over 3 miles to a new home as they can 'remember' where they live. If they are not moved far enough they just come back from where they came from! So we were moving to Judith's garden about 5 miles away for a few days then up to Waxwings as their new home. We had to wait until the evening as bees will keep flying as long as they can on long summer evenings and although it was raining when we went up to block the entrance with foam there were still a few flying . I'm hoping these bees were allowed in to the remaining hive!
The journey was great- none of the horror stories about bees getting out or hives coming open and when we pulled out the foam a few intrepid bees had a peek out to see what was going on. On Tuesday back we went and repeated the process taking the hive up to the site at Waxwings.
Trevor had worked hard to clear a little space for the hive. This time we took the hive in the morning before the bees had started flying. We placed the hive on the slabs and pulled the foam out - and stood back. The bees began to fly out, another new place to explore! Later that day we went back to remove the straps, there were lots of bees busily flying in and out- they had obviously settled in. On Saturday we will inspect the hive when we check out W1 and W2, hopefully they will not have found the moving about too traumatic and the queen will still be getting on with building up the brood.

Elderflowers

It's that time of year again- the elderflowers are blooming and my thoughts turned to making cordial. I used the same recipe as last June, but this time I tried one batch with oranges as last time but made another batch with limes instead. I haven't yet tried both so can't express an opinion, but I'm hoping the limes will give the cordial a fresh edge.


Elderflower Cordial



Waxwings 1 and 2

Weekly inspection of W1 and W2 showed a laying queen busy in both hives. A welcome sight; we were concerned about the amount of stores so gave both hives a feed to give them a boost during this cooler, damp weather when the forage is a bit sparse- the lime trees should be out in a week or so to provide some natural nourishment, let's hope it gets a bit warmer!