Bees & Biodiversity

On our farm we have a home for 8 bee hives, each contains between 50,000 - 60,000 worker bees. We are one short of W.B. Yeats 9 beehives for the honey bee. 

This time of year the bees begin to swarm. Swarming is the term used to describe the normal method by which honey bee colonies reproduce. Through swarming a group of bees separate from their single, large honey bee colony and settle elsewhere to form a second colony. It is a survival method to move from one hive to another. 

When the hive splits in two, the old queen leaves with half the troops and the remainder waits for a new queen to hatch. This year, we set up bait pillars to catch the swarming bees, we then put the colony into a new bee hive rather than losing half of them. 

We keep bees on our farm to improve the biodiversity. The bees help to cross pollinate the land. They are also lovely to be around. We collect a small amount of honey each year. Keep an eye out, we will be including a small number of jars in our gift hampers!

Keep an eye out on our Instagram and Facebook stories for updates.