If your looking for Balsam try the river Isla around Meigle
If your looking for Balsam try the river Isla around Meigle
I'd be a little careful on that one....yes balsam in abundance.......but its also VERY close to a persistent AFB spot. Also the fields adjacent to the balsam are subject to rapid flooding.Originally Posted by The Drone Ranger
Knew about the flooding risks next to the river the road was closed a couple of times last year
Didn't know about the AFB though
You can be pretty sure that going downstream there will be loads more balsam
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You do get lunch & break time refreshments thrown in too
It must have cost them a lot to row Tom Seeley over the Atlantic so I'm not grudging it
I do wish they'd drop the archaic send us a stamped addressed envelope for your tickets practice though
I kept forgetting to do it causing Fiona much distress (for which I offer unreserved apologies.)
You can buy your tickets online, and then print them (that wasn't terribly obvious - but I got there in the end).
Kitta
Been really busy....almost frantic...for the last few days rushing up to get more boxes on the hives. It was looking like a massive heather season.
However yesterday brought something of a reality check and there will be no more box runs for this season.
The reason is that in our earliest places, most of which are in Deeside, the heather is now about 80% brown and despite these last few days being perfect calluna conditions the main opportunity in that area has now passed. Exceptions are the places with heather in wooded country where the season will go on till the start of September, so progress will still be made but they have enough room left.
Thus our Deeside range will end up as a somewhat above average season. Not huge but a sound viable year. Knew things were past their best when the puddles were ringed by drinking bees and the truck attracted a lot of attention. Only a couple of places like that so far but the end is close in that area.
Amulree still going strong, heather still in decent condition there and a lot of nectar the last few days.
The Dalwhinnie to Aviemore range is however having a massive heather year, one of the most intense ling flows I have seen, and its ongoing and the bees still strong enough. Boxes put on (Lang deeps) on Sunday 14th, as a precaution as the hives were not for the most part full, were full by 23rd, and at one spot they were flying strongly in light rain on Tuesday evening. Some of the places starting to look like the Manhattan skyline. Glad I chose the places for the Speyside group visit some time before, as it could look like a con job!
These days with 17 to 20C, cloudy, not too windy, and with good humidity, are perfect ling conditions. Hot and sunny less perfect unless the ground is very wet.
Wish they were all up there! All in all it will be a good heather year, but less than it might have been due to 50% of our bees being in Deeside. Third year in a row that the A9 area has been top performer.
Well I've no idea what an average season on the heather is, as the previous 2 yrs was a complete blank on a natural resources Wales site that was £50 for 3 weeks with the dates having to be agreed mths ahead.
This year a 2nd super was half full 3days ago and I'll take a 3rd up on Saturday as the forecast for the next week is more 17-21°C and <15kts wind.
No signs of browning, but it was close to its peak I think. From the 16 I took up, I think a 3rd full super is now very possible by next weekend for the 10 that were up there first and a 2nd for sure from the 6 on the new better site ! That would mean I could recoup every penny I've ever spent on beekeeping in the space of 3 weeks. My guess is there's nothing average about that.
The mentor that I shared a site with for the last few years must be kicking himself for deciding it wasn't worth the effort.
Last edited by SDM; 26-08-2016 at 06:55 AM.
For some reason Wales has a generally lower average on heather than is the normal in Scotland and more especially Yorkshire. However, two full BS supers a hive is very respectable.
Our long term average at the heather over a period of many year, records going back to the 1970's, was 42.1lb per colony. Not recalculated it for three or four years though so expect it to have edged down a sliver to maybe 41 and a bit as four of the last 5 years have been poorer than average.
From discussion with some Welsh friends I think if you are getting 25lb or more long term (from heather, this does not include other crops) you are doing ok there. Over a decade you on average will get one bumper year and one big year. One very bad (under 50%) and the rest varying between 60% and 110% of average. Its a very variable harvest.
OK - so my ambition is to hit "respectable" on the C4U scale, not sure I'll make "very". The Angus glens where I've got a site, is to the south sort of in between the two areas C4U talks about. It an exposed site, not much bell heather and bees have to fly a bit up to the ling and (with very limited experience) I would say its been good there this year. I've been using foundation or strips, mostly in sections so that reduces my crop compared to wired/drawn comb. I put empty supers of wired foundation on my colonies yesterday, below clearer boards and full supers, ready to take off soon. I'm not expecting much more honey but would like to get some comb drawn out - see other post and following on from C4U's practice of getting the bees to do this late in the season. The colonies were putting a lot of honey in the brood boxes so potentially the Qs might have been a bit constrained. Will have to watch that. A major downside is the nature of the colonies. Bees that were lovely to work with a month or so ago are now very defensive (code for £$£%$* horrible).
I was in Deeside in July and really surprised at how much Bell heather is around up there. I am assuming that the yields C4U mentions are a combination/continuation of the two types of heather. A good site with access to both could have a really very protracted flow.
Everybody I've spoken to has said the Snowdonia heather is in poor condition. It's very patchy for sure, overgrazed in many places. Both land owners at my sites have mentioned not having heard a grouse for 3-5 yrs. The Natural Resources Wales policy of charging £50 for 3 weeks that they choose, even for 1 hive, can't be helping with pollination. And what is this Welsh obsession with bloody sheep ?
I suspect I'll remember this one for a while.
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