I often like to have some theme for my blog posts, but today I’m just writing whatever pops into my head. There are lots of things to say about bees, but after a while, it can get a bit stale. Bees are fascinating insects, and most beekeepers tend […]
I am excited that my book is currently with the talented Lucy at Carnegie Publishing. She is working on the design and layout, deciding on page sizes, fonts, illustrations, and so forth. She’s nearly done, and from the sample that I have seen it’s going to be beautiful. […]
There are many things in beekeeping which cause furious debate. One part of this, which this demonstrated below, is that different beekeepers deal with different environmental conditions. Here are some extracts from Interviews with Beekeepers on the subject of hive ventilation: Murray McGregor (Perthshire, Scotland) Steve: Another thing […]
Obsessions If you asked somebody that knows me well to describe me, they would probably mention my obsessions. I’ve had a few over the years. The biggest one, the one that would have killed me if I hadn’t broken it, was alcohol. Currently, the main one is honey […]
Beekeeping is Local Maybe I am naive or just positive and optimistic, but I’m sure that to many people I have some dangerously liberal ideas. For a start, I deliberately travelled all over the place to meet experienced bee farmers to see what I could learn. Then I […]
People and Personalities I like to think of myself as a friendly easy-going chap, although family members might point out a slight tendency towards occasional rants and intolerance. Over the years, I have evolved. I used to hold the view that people are always out to get you. […]
In beekeeping, as in life, everybody makes mistakes. Even bees occasionally make them. The hard part is owning up to them. Douglas Adams said, “a common mistake that people make when trying to design something foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.” I hate the fact […]
I love science. I’ve even got a chemistry degree, but don’t ask me about it because that was over thirty years ago. As soon as I left university, I went to the City to do accountancy. It’s hard to deny the importance of science in our lives. The […]
I met up with a very busy Ray Olivarez of Olivarez Honey Bees last October at his company headquarters in Orland, Northern California. In this audio clip from the interview he talks about his famous Hobby Day which is coming up this weekend, as well as pollination, mite […]
This is the second in a series of posts in which I provide a short audio clip of my interviewee. Today I’m featuring Murray McGregor of Denrosa Apiaries in Perthshire, Scotland. He has over 3,000 colonies and his main honey crop comes from the heather. In this clip […]
