Gardening blog
Week thirty five August 26th - September 2nd
2005
Friday 2nd September 2005 another hot sunny day and more honey to extract.
Thursday 1st of September 2005 Another lovely sunny day and yet more honey taken off the bees hives. My bees are generally good natured and easy to work admittedly some hives more so than others but suddenly one hive this year has turned and they like to sting. Not only as, or when, the hive is opened but afterwards and for some distance from hive's site as they follow for fifty yards and still try to sting. I had the first fire for months (I burning bindweed again) in the still evening air the smoke went straight up in a column as there wasn't even the lightest of breezes from any direction.
Wednesday 31st of August 2005 August goes out in a sizzling heat wave. Great weather for what I want to do right now - I took the honey off two more hives today put in Varoa control strips and started to feed them. Even the evening and night time temperature is hot - so extracting the honey is easier too. I still have seven hives left to do in total and hopefully will get two more done tomorrow.
Tuesday 30th August 2005 Another hot sunny day and the chance to open up more bee hives take off more honey. After taking off the honey I'm putting Varoa control strips into the brood box and starting to feed with sugar syrup to build up supplies for the winter.
August 29th 2005 Bank holiday Monday the day was
hot and sunny without a cloud in the sky. My
day started with a knock on the font door and my attention being drawn
to the bees in my car. Stupidly I had left the car open last night after
bringing a super of honey in and the bees had found the super with wet
frames in it sticky with honey. Once a free source of honey has been
located it doesn't take long for the information to transmitted and the
bees to arrive on mass.
This hot sunny weather is an excellent opportunity
to sort out bee hive and make sure the queens are in the right place.
Tina's swarm -
I call them that as it was Tina's small apple tree that they settled
in - I housed in situ in very old equipment with the queen laying in
supers rather than a brood box. Although they have been happy enough
and making honey, I decided that they do need
to more convenient place to get at them (although they are staying on
Tina's plot) and have put them into regular national frames and brood
box taking honey off at the same time. The next job for this hive will
be to put in anti Varoa strips and feed them up with sugar syrup that
they will store for feed in the winter.
Sunday 28th August 2005 A real summers day - warm
with the odd fluffy cloud coming accross on a balmy breeze from the south
west. The bees are busy out and about on the Golden Rod and
on the first of the Ivy that has started into bloom. The
cottager has been left pretty much alone for many weeks now and I was
hoping there would be some honey to take out of it so I opened it up.
The queen
was laying and there was some honey distributed throughout the two supers.
But not as much as I had hoped for. So I didn't take it and put the suppers
back. The weather forecast is good for the week ahead and just one more
hot week now could make all the difference.
Saturday 27th August 2005. My day has been
dominated with extracting honey. There are buckets and pots with honey
in all over the kitchen. At the end of the day I took six supers with sticky
empty
frames up to the hives to give back to the bees to clean up. I then made
a trip to the bee supplies man to buy more jars.
2004
Monday
30th August 2004 saved some seed from my 'Opium' Poppies that are double
pink and purple.
Saturday 28th August 2004 I can't resist plants for sale at the side of the road - bought Rudbeckia Sonora (Black Eyed Susan)
2002
1st
September Planted
out a row of strawberry runners in Bernithan Court Farm kitchen garden
