Collecting my first Honey bee Swarm

Heavens, I have spent this evening collecting my first ever bee swarm from a neighbour's front garden. Be careful what you wish for as I had just been saying last week that I wanted a swarm this year - however I rather hoped someone else might have collected it for me and delivered it to my door!

I got home about 6pm to find an excited message about the bees and went to investigate to find them in shrub about four feet off the ground. I dashed home to improvise a swarm collecting kit.  I chose my smartest cardboard box (thank you Emma Bridgewater) and a white sheet,  loaded my bee things into a wheelbarrow and suited up (bee stings hurt).

Needless to say that the edifying sight of me in my bee suit waving a smoker around drew a crowd of interested onlookers so I had to pretend I knew what I was doing. Sarah gamely put on my spare jacket and helped me cut away the branches the bees were hanging from so I could put them in the cardboard box. I then inverted this over the white sheet and propped up a corner so the bees could get in and then gently smoked the bees remaining in the shrub.  So far so good. The idea is that if the queen is in the cardboard box, the flying bees will be attracted to her and should all make their way in as dusk falls.  I then dashed home to get a spare hive ready for its new occupants.

When I returned at 7.30 pm, the bees had obviously read the same text book as me and were all in the box. I  wrapped the sheet over the top of the box and loaded into the wheelbarrow and took them home (followed by the interested audience). I then had to get them into the hive. This was achieved by tipping the box over the hive and shaking them in. The bees at the entrance to the hive then fanned pheremones to encourage stragglers to make their way inside. Some made their way back into the cardboard box probably attracted by the lingering scent of the queen.  I shook these onto the white sheet which I had put over a board sloping up to the hive entrance and encouraged them up with the smoker.

Well fingers crossed the queen is in there.  I will feed them sugar syrup tomorrow and hopefully they will stay.

New Beekeeping Course

I am just about the start a nine week introduction course to beekeeping. I am hoping now I have been keeping bees for a year, I will be able to get more out the course than before. I will keep you posted with the topics covered but hopefully it will mean that this Spring I will be better prepared to cope with my growing colony (fingers crossed they get through the winter first).

Few days away

Sorry for the radio silence, grabbed a few days away in Malta visiting family. Amazing how soothing it is to spend the evening sitting on a terrace over looking the Grand Harbour, getting aquainted with the local wines. Stayed at the Westin Dragonara in St Julians and yes it was warm enough to sit by the pool with a pina colada.

We finally managed to visit the Hypogeum which is the only prehistoric underground temple in the world, and a UNESCO world heritage site similar in age to Stonehenge! Came home to find winter had returned although the garden is in full Spring mode, the orchard is in blossom, I just hope it warms up a little so the bees can take advantage of it.

Busy Bees - On The Importance of Bee Suits

Plucked up courage and opened the beehive last night. I needed to add some more storage space before the blossom appears in the orchard and the honey flow starts in earnest. I have invested in a full bee suit this year having tried the slightly more glamorous jeans and jacket approach which led to multiple stings in sensitive places. I also made sure I was wearing a thick layer underneath! The smoker has new fuel this year as the dried grass and cardboard approach wasn't working well and you do tend to panic if you are surrounded by angry bees and the smoker has gone out whilst being stung.

The girls have glued the hive together with propolis and it took some prising to get the lid off. Propolis is derived from plant resins and sets hard, the bees use it like a glue to plug any gaps in their hive - its very effective. I had a quick look in the hive and all seems well with lots of bees and stores. The storage I have added is called a "super" - a shallow box full of frames of foundation wax from which I hope to harvest honey this year. 

UFO found in Kitchen Garden

Whilst keeping an eye out for bees in the garden over the weekend, I happened across this rather peculiar flying beastie. Furry like a bumblebee but with long spindly legs and with slightly sinister looking bat like markings on the wings. Having a lance like proboscis and drinking nectar like a hoverfly or hawkwing moth. Initially I thought this was a hoverfly but further investigations via the trusty Interweb has identified this UFO as a Greater Beefly (Bombylius major).

Rather alarmingly they are parasitic on solitary bees which we have plenty of in the garden. I hope they don't have a negative effect on the rather healthy population of bumblebees in the garden.

April in the Kitchen Garden

Hooray some sunshine this afternoon and I spent some time in the garden. I lured the hens into the fruit cage where they happily spent a couple of hours turning over the ground and hopefully finding some slugs. I spent some time weeding raised beds and transplanting seedlings into the new bee plant area as well as scattering seeds on bare patches. I put down some crimson clover and tufted vetch seeds in the meadow. I bought some mixed viola plants during the week and have edged the beds with them and also used them to plant up a lovely purple glass container for the house.

The bees were out in force and finding red dead nettle in flower as well as a speedwell and lesser celandine. I walked around the meadow and the violets are out and some self heal. Cuckoo flower and cowslips are on their way. Suddenly all the fruit trees are in bud and the hawthorne is showing green. I saw a couple of ladybirds (of the English variety), the continental ones are still crawling around the window cills in the house.

I planted out little gem lettuces which have been growing on the greenhouse. I have a raised bed (6ft x 4ft) with an integral cold frame made to the Geoff Hamilton plans (gardeners world).  Follow this link to the HDRA Garden Organic website for instructions on how to make one using timber, water pipe and plastic sheeting  click here  Under here from left to right, I have mixed leaves, radiccio, little gem, hispi cabbages and radishes . There are also lots of corncockles appearing under here which I will move. I planted a couple of roses, a Charles de Mills and a David Austin lucky dip from the bargain bin at Notcutts - it didn't have a label so I have no idea of the variety.

My friend Sian has designed Carol Klein's new book - Grow Your Own Garden and it has inspired me to divide perennials and take cuttings for the first time. I potted up a whole tray of hardy geraniums divided up from a small clump and also taken softwood cuttings of sage and garden pinks. Last autumns penstemon cuttings survived the winter - unlike the ones planted in the garden - and are now growing away happily.

I have separated the poorly hen from the flock and she is now in an ark by herself. She has damaged an eye and is not coping well with only one eye working. Today she looked a bit brighter, I am dosing her with Baytril and bathing the eye with aloe vera so fingers crossed.

Here is a picture of the potted up geraniums in the greenhouse. Behind them are lavender Hidcote plugs which I am growing on. They arrived as mini plugs a couple of weeks ago from Thompson & Morgan (84 in total).

More tomorrow as I plan to spend Easter Sunday in the garden if the weather is not too bad.

Growing Plants for Honey Bees

I thought you might like to know about the easy plants you can grow to encourage bees in your garden. Since putting my hive in last year, I have been sowing hardy annuals and perennials to provide them with a rich source of nectar and pollen. As a rule, simple flowers are easier for the bees to access the nectar although early compositae such as dandelions are in important early food source - so leave them to flower if you can.

I am raising crimson clover and sainfoin in modules to plant out and have also been scattering seed on bare soil on an area we have recently cleared by moving the compost heaps. I read in the British Beekeeping magazine that bees are highly attracted to these plants so am trying them. They germinated really easily and are often used as a green manure so the seeds are readily available. visit the bbka website to find out more. http://www.britishbee.org.uk/

Phacelia is an old fashioned garden plant which seeds itself easily and flowers for ages. I have sown lots of seed using last years flower heads and have also transplanted seedings appearing in the vegetable beds. This plant can also be used as a green manure and dug in before flowering - which seems a shame. Borage is also self sown. If you are growing comfrey for making compost or plant food, these flowers are also very attracting to bees. I also have corncockle which seeds itself freely around so have added this to the mix. A traditional wildflower of the cornfields, its is a highly decorative plant, 2-3 foot high with magenta flowers.

Later on in the season, alliums are also popular bee plants and I leave some of last years onions and leeks in the beds to provide some useful food sources. I have included a picture of a bumble bee on a garlic flower taken in the kitchen garden in July. I also have californian poppy seeding around and young echinops everywhere which are popular with the bees.

Even in the smallest of gardens you can dedicate a corner to growing flowers to help the bees.

A Novice Beekeeper - March Diary

I am a relatively new beekeeper. I took the introduction to beekeeping course last year with the mid-Kent beekeepers, and I took delivery of my first bees in July which is quite late in the year. I keep the bees at the bottom of the garden in an old fashioned beehive known as a WBC Hive - this is the pagoda style, painted white with a metal covered roof. Yes it would be lovely to have some honey this year, but my main aim is keep a healthy colony of bees.


I fed the bees lots of sugar syrup in the autumn to make sure the colony grew large enough to survive the winter with plenty of food stores. I also treated them against disease - The winter bee lives much longer than her hard working cousin the summer bee, six months as compared to just six weeks and parasites have much more time to take hold in the hive. Also the colony needs to maintain its warmth in colder months and needs to be large enough to generate this heat by clustering together.

I am pleased to say that now we finally have some warmer weather, I have seen bees flying around the garden and a few joined me in the greenhouse today. Rosemary is beginning to flower and is very popular with the bees, although the plants have taken a beating in the winter cold. I have planted spring bedding and bulbs in the kitchen garden to help provide some early nectar for them.


I am hoping not to have to open them up too often and leave them as much alone as possible (yes I did get stung last year)! The main task is to provide the bees with the room they need - by adding extra layers to the hive - and to prevent them from swarming - although I now have a second hive, which is empty so an early swarm wouldn't be too bad (as long as they didn't disappear completely). Some beekeepers keep an empty hive to tempt a swarm to settle. Bees are in short supply this year due to the increase in new beekeepers looking to establish their colonies and last year hive equipment was in short supply.

The queen should be laying eggs and raising young to replace the workers which have overwintered and who will now be nearing the end of their lives.

You might not know that all the worker bees are female and yes - are responsible for all the food gathering and young rearing in the hive. The Drones - males - are produced in small numbers and their only job is to mate with a new queen. They are usually kicked out of the hive in the autumn by the workers to die in the winter cold.

welcome to my blog

Well this is the brave new world - first Twitter and now my very own blog, welcome one and all. Spent the day in the greenhouse pricking out crimson clover and Sanfoin grown for the bees. The chickens escaped from the run and ran amock in the kitchen garden, mad for the new grass and then discovered the joys of digging for worms in the raised beds. I must be more careful with the gate! I have been creating a new flowering area principally to grow nectar rich flowers for my bees to enjoy. I broadcast seeds last autumn grown elsewhere in the garden and now have corncockle, crimson clover, sanfoin, phacelia, borage, mullein and teasel all coming through. I have emptied packets of poppy seeds in the area too so have my fingers crossed for a good crop.

The new willow "fedge" is coming to life. This is a simple cross weave made with prunings from the willow tunnel and planted through weed surpressing fabric and mulched with bark. The idea is to hide the compost bins, although when the hazel platt grows this should help to. Thanks to the squirrels raiding last years nut crop, there were lots of young hazel trees springing up in the vegetable beds.