Fit2Fight is now in Germany. Next stop France!
11 December 2024
My lecture at the National Honey Show is now live on YouTube.
https://youtu.be/hxAT_lHjxgY?si=ushjCbH6dtqOwAKU
9 December 2024
Historic event! The first blind beekeeper to lead a British Beekeepers Association:
Former Royal Navy Commander and Barrister, Penny Melville-Brown OBE, was elected as the Chairman of the Fareham and District Beekeepers’ Association last week. The hives of over 100 members of this thriving organisation stretch from the coast at Gosport to the countryside north of Wickham. Their bees pollinate local plants and trees, gardens and crops and produce top-class real honey that many sell.
Penny said, “I confess that I leave the bee-suit to my husband, Alan Baxter, who has all the knowledge and experience of practical beekeeping alongside his Asian Hornet expertise https://www.alanbaxtersblogs.co.uk/ . But I’ve learned masses and am fully involved in extracting and using the honey, making our mead and have even tried creating beeswax polish. Beekeeping can involve the whole family and introduces children to our natural world.”
The FDBKA provides friendly training and mentoring for new beekeepers, shared learning opportunities for the more experienced, regular meetings, loan equipment, apiary visits, an annual honey show, speakers for other organisations and a great supply of local honey for hay-fever sufferers and lovers of good food. Find out more and how to get involved at https://farehambka.co.uk/ .
Penny is supported by a great team committed to growing and strengthening the skills of Association members to maintain their ancient craft in the face of climate change, the Asian Hornet threat and other challenges to our environment.
She was still serving in the Royal Navy when her sight failed before launching a new career running her own business, holding a wide range of public appointments and roles in voluntary organisations before winning an international prize for blind people, cooking around the world and publishing the book of her adventures. She has been awarded an OBE and Honorary Doctorate https://www.pennymelvillebrown.com/
Super proud of you Penny!
18 November 2024
One programme of study ends and preparation for the next challenge begins. In January I start the Cornell University Masters Program. This is the Ivy League University in NY State that holds a special place for students of the honey bee for its research led by Professor Tom Seeley into honey bee behaviour (I suppose I will have to learn to spell it behavior for the duration of the course!).
The Course is very research orientated as you would expect, so lots of research papers to read before it starts.
Whilst all this was happening I was elected Chairman of the Catisfield Memorial Hall Trustees, a local charity serving the community here www.catisfieldmemorialhall.co.uk
So we now have 2 Chairmen in our household !!
16 November 2024
Just taken the final Master Beekeeper Advanced Theory Exam and feeling mightily relieved, even though we have to wait 6 weeks for the results. Studying 'The Modules' as they are known in Beek jargon, and their 7 exams, have dominated much of my life, and that of my incredibly supportive spouse Penny, for the past 4 1/2 years. My next step is to obtain the Microscopy Certificate next November 2025, followed by a 3-day assessment for the Advanced Husbandry Certificate in 2026. If I succeed in all these I will have earned the coveted title of Master Beekeeper. I just hope it will have been worth it.
Artificial Intelligence is being developed to help us to monitor for the presence of Asian Hornets. My friend Dr Pete Kennedy and the team at Exeter University have developed a prototype monitoring station dubbed Vespa-AI which uses a simple Raspberry pi operating system and a miniature camera to take a photo every 30 seconds of insects visiting the bait pad to feed. The AI program has been trained to distinguish between AH and other similar-looking species and it sends a signal to a mobile phone when one appears. Here's one installed in my home apiary.
Tree with undergrowth
Close up of the nest
Tree climber at the nest
Nest bagged and ready to lower
Dan Ethridge, RBI holding the nest.
25/09/2024
Exciting day yesterday in support of the National Bee Unit removing a large Asian Hornet nest from the Old Cemetery in Southampton. The nest was high up in a tall tree which was very overgrown with Ivy and other vegetation. The ground was littered with half-buried graves and tombstones so access with a cherry picker was impossible. The intrepid pair of tree climbers hacked and chopped their way up until they were close enough to reach with the long lance insecticide gun and dispense two doses of the poison to kill the occupants of the nest. Then they climbed higher and cut out the branch on which the nest was built, bagged it and lowered it to the ground. The nest is probably the biggest found so far this year. It will be sent to the government laboratory for analysis to tell us if it's a new queen flown, blown or hitch--hiked from France, or if it's home grown.
Congratulations to Dan Etheridge, our Regional Bee Inspector, and his team of tree climbers for a thoroughly professional job.
It's now mid September and time to stimulate our queens to lay the eggs that will emerge in October as the vitally important winter bees. These workers will live until next spring, keep the queen warm and fedampton, and help raise the growing family of 2025 workers.
31 August, it's the end of the honey season and we've finished extracting the summer blossom crop.
Despite a dodgy spring and summer weather -wise, our bees managed to produce an average surplus of 42lbs of delicious, fragrant honey per hive, whilst still leaving enough stores to see them through until next spring.
Next job is to complete the varroa treatment and put the honey supers into winter store having protected them against wax moth.
Looking forward to the privilege of speaking at the National Honey Show at Sandown Park in October.
My latest batch of grafted queens have emerged in the incubator and been transferred to Apidea mini mating nucs. Thus begins the next stage in their perilous journey towards becoming a mated, laying queen ready to head her own colony.
Although they have been selected from my calmest, gentlest colony, mating is a lottery over which I have no control. They will fly to the nearest Drone Congregation Area where they will be inseminated by about 15 different drones. The fittest and strongest drones usually get there first so if there are a few scallywags amongst them her offspring are likely to display some of their genetic characteristics. Only time will tell.
GENERAL HUSBANDRY ASSESSMENT 13 JUNE 2024
Cock-a-hoop to learn that I passed my General Husbandry Assessment with flying colours! This is a major milestone and means I am one important step closer to achieving my aim of becoming a Master Beekeeper.
Sponsoring Women in Birindi, Uganda to create sustainable income from beekeeping.
11 March 2024 Proud to have been elected to serve as a Trustee of Hampshire Beekeepers Association at the AGM yesterday. Looking forward to helping to further the cause of good Beekeeping in the County and beyond.
See my article on Fit2Fight in the March edition of BeeCraft Magazine.
