It should be fairly straightforward, shouldn’t it? A colony makes several virgin queens, eventually whittles them down to one, and she flies off on several mating flights. She returns to the welcoming embrace of her workers, and begins the long process of laying hundreds or thousands of eggs every day during the summer, autumn, and … Read more
A year ago, the very idea of starting to raise queens at this time was madness, such was the hideous weather. This year, spring has been kinder, and I have already done my first batch of grafts. Now, I know that the easiest part of raising queens is making cells, and getting virgins well-mated is … Read more
Listen instead of read: https://share.descript.com/view/iXbI3vkK9PH I went and bought “Genetic Priorities for Conservation of Native Honey Bees” by Dorian Pritchard, one of the “big voices” in an area of beekeeping that is foreign to me. It seems well produced and has some interesting ideas, but I find the logic a little confused. But maybe it’s … Read more
A review of Healthy Bees, Heavy Hives that recently appeared in BeeCraft magazine got me thinking. It was generally a positive review, but towards the end there was some criticism for missing something out. In fact, it stated: “I believe the absence of a balanced argument on the subject of queen imports is a significant … Read more
When I interviewed Murray at his home in Perthshire in 2017, I asked him about honey production. Firstly I wanted to know how much honey he makes. (That’s with an ‘h’ not an ‘m’!) Average Crop per Hive Murray: Our long-term average? We don’t really count the blossom much, but we should be looking at … Read more
Humans (and walruses) are part of the natural world. We are animals. Sometimes we like to set ourselves aside from nature as if we are not part of it, but this is wrong. However, there is no denying the powerful and often damaging impact that homo sapiens have made upon our planet and its inhabitants. … Read more