This week has felt long – sick children and cold weather. Today the sun came out! The bees are out flying and some are bringing pollen back to their hives. The garden is stirring and the early spring flowers are beginning to open.
These are from our garden – it is so good to see results from the bulbs I have planted.
One of our neighbours has this spectacular display on their lawn – a real pollen feast for bees!
Yesterday morning we woke up to find snow covering our world! The hives on our roof looked so chilly, although the snow acts as an extra layer of insulation.
M and I were stuck inside as he is suffering from a nasty cold, so we decided to make some marmalade. This year I substituted some of the sugar with our honey – it has made the marmalade have a deeper more flavoursome taste – delicious on my toast this morning!
Last night was Burns Night, and as we are partial to a bit of haggis we decided to invite a few friends and make a traditional meal.
For the first time I made cranachan using our honey, and I have to say that it was really delicious!
I used the recipe from here http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/cranachan_66101
The only thing I would say is that the recipe makes enough for 8.
The last few weeks have been cold here, freezing overnight. I haven’t seen the bees flying recently – it is too chilly for them! The garden is stirring though. The Winter Aconites and Snowdrops have just started to flower. I planted them both a couple of years ago and it is lovely to see them doing well. Flowers like these provide bees with vital food on warmer winter days. The queen in each hive will hopefully be starting to lay eggs again soon after a winter break. The brood requires pollen to develop, so having these winter flowers around is important for their survival.
This morning was mild and the sun even came out! I spotted one of our kittens chasing a bee outside, so I went to have a look at our hives. It was fantastic to see bees busily zipping in and out of the hive – I haven’t seen them flying for several weeks because it has been too cold – We have to leave them in peace and not disturb the cluster that they form to keep warm, so it is always a relief to see them out and about again.
This time of the year is quiet for the bees, they spend most of the time clustered inside their hives keeping warm. On the few bright days we have had recently there have been a few bees nipping out to relieve themselves, but they quickly zip back into the hive.
I have been tying up our boxes of cut comb ready for Christmas – I think they make a lovely gift. My favourite way to eat it is to spread a chunk on to some hot toast to enjoy with a big mug of tea …. Mmmmmm!
I have always been a fan of Burt’s Bees lip balm, and now that we have our own supply of beeswax and honey I thought that I’d have a go at making something similar. Browsing the internet and studying various ingredient lists gave me lots of ideas of what to put into mine. This morning M and I had some time to play around with a few variations and we came up with our favourite recipe which we’d like to share with you. It is very quick and easy to make.
To make a batch of 9 10ml tins we used:
1 tbsp Unrefined shea butter
1 tbsp Cold pressed coconut oil
2 tbsp Sweet almond oil
1 block of beeswax (approx 1oz)
1 tsp honey
1/2 tsp peppermint essential oil
4 drops of rosemary essential oil
We melted everything expect for the peppermint and rosemary oils very gently in a double boiler. Once everything had melted we stirred in the oils and poured it into our tins. That’s it! They take about 20 minutes to harden enough to put the lids on. M will testify that it is actually good enough to eat!
I bought all our ingredients (except of course the wax and honey) from Naturally Balmy
All we need to do is put some stickers on the lids and we’ll have some very nice Christmas presents to give away.
Last month I heard Dave Goulson’s fascinating talk about bumble bees at the London Honey Show. Since then I’ve read his book A Sting in the Tale
At the National Honey show last weekend there was a stall by the company Meadow in my Garden. http://www.meadowinmygarden.co.uk They specialise in creating different seed mixes for various situations. I’ve decided to try out their shady mix for an empty patch in our north facing front garden. I’ve just sowed it, so with luck next spring and summer we should have some flowers. If it goes really well perhaps I’ll consider digging up some of the lawn!
Now that all our hives have plenty of honey in them to keep them stocked through the winter I have closed them up. I’ve put mouse guards over the entrances to prevent vermin from creeping in and helping themselves to the honey and brood. I have put straps round the hives, if they get blown over then at least they will still be held together and should be relatively easy to right again. I have also stuffed the roofs with insulation to prevent excessive heat loss.
We have also put up a temporary willow fence along the railings in front of our home hives. They are 4 floors off the ground on the side of a hill – the wind is pretty strong up there, so I hope that the fence will help to stop it from howling straight into the hives and chilling the bees.
This very mild autumn has meant that there has been plenty of forage for the bees. Yesterday I noticed that they were heading towards our neighbour’s garden – she has a couple of large Fatshedera which are currently in full flower.
