2020 - A bad year for blogs, but a good year for bugs

It has been a bad year for blogs, but a good year for bugs.

 

I have not written here since June, not for lack of motivation, but because life has become busier thanks to this Year of the Virus.

The virus has been deadly for far too many humans. But the lockdown has helped nature to thrive, starting with the insects. Here are a few examples:

First, a remarkably white spider.

...and the murderer was...Mrs White, in the Conservatory

 

Then - a reassurance for what you are about to read - two pollinators on our enthusiastic Cardus thistle.

 

This gives me a buzz, honey...

A beautifully camouflaged Hawk moth - I think it may be a Lime Hawk moth, Mimas tiliae, on the donkey stable door.

Green Hawk Down

 

And now for the bad news. My bees have died, victims of the Asian Hornet, Vespa velutina. Despite my best efforts with a solar-powered electric trap, and netting, the hornets got into the hives and killed all of the occupants.

To be, or Not to bee

 

I found the last hornet, itself killed by the bees, on the 6th December. 

The gory remains

 

I am going to take some time before I start see-keeping again. It's fascinating, but I don't want to risk starting again, until I understand better how to manage this new predator.

 

So 2020 - a bug year..

Hypodermic murder

Every time they leave the safety of the hive, the bees are exposed to dangerous, bloody, unforgiving Nature. Fly too high, and the beautiful bee eaters (Merops apiaster) will catch them. Hang around outside the hive, and the imported Asian Hornet (Vespa velutina) will capture, and then disect them.

But I'd never seen this before. An Assassin Bug, Rhinocoris iracundus, killing a bee, by stabbing it with its hypodermic mouth parts and then - I assume - sucking the insides out like some honeyed cocktail:

Fly-by dinner

Juiced in time for tea

Table setting, with orange blossom

 It's rough, out here at the Croft.

Sticky end

This is what happens when you try to raid honey from my hives. You get got:

Caught in the Matrix

I found this hawk moth (Sphingidae) corpse when I was cleaning out the hives this winter.

Runny Honey

My first honey harvest today!

Miquel had loaned me his centrifuge, and today started sunny and calm, so I set out the kitchen ready for the harvest:

Not ergonomic, but it works

I sealed the windows. Not to stop the bees coming in, but to stop them getting out. If they escape they head off to tell their mates, and in no time you have 10,000 bees trying to get in to rob your harvested honey.

Then up to the hives with all the necessary equipment...

..and back with one full upper and two sets of frames. It has been rainy, so the bees are not yet really ready with the honey.

In the kitchen I weighed the honey.

That honey is dense

Then removed the cappings from the frames, centrifuged them and filtered the  honey. 

Watch that knife, Crofter.

 

Result: 26.5kg of fresh honey!

Honey, I'm waxed

My plans for a hive-full of honey have been poleaxed by the wax moth, Achroia grisella. Against the advice of my mentor, Miguel the honey man, I had kept a hive without a queen. The results - a weakened hive unable to defend itself against the moth - are dramatic:

Moth invasion

Coo-coo cocoon

I took down the hive at the weekend, scattering the few bees left there to the four winds, and incinerated the whole lot as a precaution.

Burn 'em all

Bee day

I've been at the bees today:

I can't give up smoking

I am a total beginner at bees, so I'm likely to make mistakes. But this, for pretty well sure, is a frame of capped brood in the typical oval laying pattern at the centre of the frame, with a ring of larvae around it, and a ring of honey beyond that:

I was framed, mate