Category: Hobbies & Pastimes

Misty Hills on Dartmoor 0

Misty Hills

I’ve always liked photos of hills in the mist receding into the distance at sunset – I just never get the opportunity to take photos of them myself, but whilst chilling at the campsite last week the opportunity presented itself, so here’s the view across Dartmoor from our tent.

Double Kidney 0

A Whole Load of Moths

It was a busy night in the moth trap last night. Despite not putting out a sheet, just the trap itself and not investigating it early in the morning there was still 185 moths in the trap, from 36 different species. Seven of which were new garden records as well. 1 x Oligia sp. 1...

Wild flowers in the dunes 0

Forage in the Dunes

Morgan and I had a nice little walk through the dunes earlier. We were actually wandering across to the beach to check out what was happening with the RSPB Shear Madness. Unfortunately there wasn’t anyone there so we couldn’t find out more about the Manx Shearwaters or let them know that I often see them when...

The Trouble with Bees 0

The Trouble with Bees

The trouble with bees is that you just never know quite what to expect! Our last inspection was pretty good, all four colonies in all four hives were looking up with queens, eggs and larvae in all of them, no signs of swarming and they were beginning to draw out empty frames and start building...

Which way now? 0

Geocaching and Everytrail

It was the first day of the summer holidays today and right on cue the weather was set to take a turn for the worse. It didn’t look as though it would be too bad in the morning though so Morgan and I headed out for a walk. We had a few things to do...

Our Apiary 0

Our Growing Apiary

As mentioned in our latest beekeeping update, our apiary that started out with two hives currently has an additional third hive and a nuc box in it. We’re not plnning on keeping them all with full colonies in them and will probably merge them into two colonies before the end of the summer but at the moment...

Geocaching with a Samsung Galaxy S2 2

Geocaching with a Samsung Galaxy S2

Now, I may be a bit of an Apple fan boy, but when someone offers me an alternative toy to play with I’m not going to say no. Yesterday, Alan from Bridging the Rural Divide popped around with a lovely looking Samsung Galaxy S2 smart phone. It has the ‘everytrail’ loaded onto it and they...

A Frame of Bees 1

Bees on the Mend

Saturday proved to be a perfect day for beekeeping. Light winds, sunshine and temperatures around 18ºC. We were due to make hive inspections of all of the hives in our apiary and had a bit of re-homing to do on one colony. Pendam – Nuc Box This Nuc box contains an artificial swarm from the...

Cucumbers and pototoes 0

The Garden Yields

Our hard work on the garden is beginning to pay off. As well as looking nice out there, we’ve already had some garden produce. As well as the strawberries we’ve had a few raspberries with plenty more on the way. The blackcurrants and red currants seem to have been striped by the birds, but we’re...

Huddles of bees on Clettwr 0

Hive Inspections – Progress?

We made our weekly hive inspections on Wednesday afternoon and there was some progress. The bees are still acting a little strangely though. Both the colony in the Clettwr hive and the colony in the triple nuc box (a caught swarm from Clettwr) are very active. They are up and busy from first light until...