An End, and a Beginning

An End

On Thursday, I went to see what the bees in hive #1 (Laura's hive) were up to.  It was a warm spring day, so they should have been busy.  They weren't.  In fact, there were no bees going into or out of the hive.

A quick look inside confirmed my worst fears:

Another cluster of dead bees, and another dead queen.  They'd died in a very similar way to hive #2.  I'm not sure why - but I'd like to know - so I've kept 30 workers, plus the queen, to be sent away for analysis.  It may be disease - you can see some partially-capped pupae (that should be fully capped) toward the bottom-right of the picture.  Or, it may be that they starved because they couldn't hydrate the hard ivy honey that had crystallised in the cells (you can see a patch of it in the bottom-left of the picture).  But whatever the reason, I currently have no bees.

So, for the second time this year, I had to burn everything:

It's sad to have lost all my bees.  However, their bloodlines live on in Ian's and Jessica's bees and also in the ZEST hive.  So there are still Beechen Bees in Widcombe and Bathwick.  In other words, all is not lost, and I need to view this as more a setback than a disaster.

I'm going to concentrate on the ZEST hive for the next couple of weeks, and then think about what to do next.

A Beginning

Who's this furry friend?

It's Pippie!  Mrs Beekeeper and I drove over to an animal sanctuary in Cheltenham on Good Friday to collect her and bring her to live with us in her new Forever Home!  This is my very first picture of Pippie in our house - she is just leaving the bathroom where she had clearly been checking the facilities (an important task, since that is where we have put one of her litter trays).

No cat could ever replace our dear Patsy.  But it's nice to have the patter of little paws around the house once again.  Anyway, Pippie is already showing herself to have quite a different personality from Pats.  She is somewhat shy, but inquisitive, and when she is awake she is a little bundle of energy.  She has got to know the inside of the house, and has already been on a couple of excursions outside to enjoy the bank holiday weather and sniff all the spring smells in the garden.

Welcome to Widcombe, little Pippie - I think you will be very happy here.