A mother-daughter beekeeping adventure
After confirming the Randalstown queen was gone, I had to pick a fix from a shelf of methods that all disagree with each other. Here’s how I weighed them up, what I actually did, and two honest cautions for anyone in the same spot.
So that’s what I did. I built hive stands. I tidied the garden. I enjoyed, genuinely enjoyed, having nothing beekeeping related that needed doing. If you keep bees you will know how strange that feels. Standing in your own garden with your hands empty, on purpose, is not something this hobby prepares you for. I … Read more
BEE HAPPY HONEY | The Bee Garden | July July in the bee garden: lavender, borage, and the summer moment when everything finally comes together. We bought lavender at Galgorm in March and within about forty minutes of getting home it was planted in a honey pot by the apiary. We were not entirely sure … Read more
The trail camera caught the chickens. Dad spotted three squirrels. Bee Girl reopens the case of who has really been visiting the hive, and Grandad is already insufferable.
BEE HAPPY HONEY | The Bee Garden | Between June and July The blossom is over, the summer flowers are not quite here yet, and your colony is bigger than it has ever been. This is the moment every new beekeeper needs to know about. We had been feeling pretty good about things. The hawthorn … Read more
If you have been following along, you will know that we have had a season. You can read the full version in How Do I Fix This but the short version is this: a hive that went queenless, a plan that went sideways, and two beekeepers standing at the apiary feeling considerably less confident than … Read more
Before I start, a quick note. There are approximately twenty different ways to do everything in beekeeping and every beekeeper you meet will swear theirs is correct. They’re probably all right. This is just our way, our season, our very humbling few weeks. Your mileage may vary. The bees’ mileage definitely will. Right. Now that’s … Read more
BEE HAPPY HONEY | The Bee Garden | June White clover and bramble. Two of the most important bee plants in Northern Ireland are growing in gardens and hedgerows right now, and most people are trying to get rid of them. There is a moment in early summer when the clover comes into flower in … Read more
We joined a queen rearing group, grafted a larva, got one queen from twenty attempts, and let Bee Girl do the fun bit. Meet Clover. She is marked white, she is in a nuc, and she has no idea what is waiting for her.
The weather these past few weeks has been miserable. Showers, thunder, cold snaps dropping into single digits when May should be settling into the teens. And like a lot of beekeepers I know, weekends are realistically my only window to get into the hive properly. The girls don’t care about my Monday to Friday. The … Read more