I have extracted the honey. I had over 17 litres of honey from 2 bee hives and have jarred 64 jars with 250g of honey in each. I still have over a litre to be jarred. Two thirds were from the Orchard and the final third was from my garden.
I visited a local allotment open day on Sunday after being invited by a couple of local bee keepers, and allotment holders. I arrived about midday the open event had started at 11am and the bee keepers had put on a stand, showing actual bees in a closed glass frame and a virtual hive, they shared the stand with chicken owners which were selling eggs and showing different varieties of chickens. The Bee keepers had put up their excess honey for sale they had complete sold out by the time I arrived. They asked me and some other bee keepers if we had excess honey that we wanted to sell some. I and others gave them some honey which they sold. They sold 22 of my jars.
This is the first time I have sold honey and I found it really difficult. I am not as business minded as others, and on previous occasions I just gave it away, to friends, family, neighbours, work colleagues etc. The sale didn't feel right to me, the people that bought the honey will enjoying it and I am certain they will like it, its lovely. However I won't get the pleasure of knowing if they liked it personally and having that relationship with the consumer. It was a disappointment, however the money raised will go to getting some labels printed and feeding the bees perhaps later in the year. After handing over the honey I wanted to take it back, but financially I have to sell some just to help meet the costs. Also giving away the honey is not the best solution, as I want everyone to have my honey.
At the orchard I have started clearing out the weeds underneath the trees. Its a slow process, and I seem to get distracted very easily. Chris the guy who owns the stables wanted to chat about the hay, its not very tall and he was disappointed, by its growth this year. However we have lots of flowers and some hay which looks nice. Chris talked about the price of hay. He has sold a number of the horses and it seems like he is shrinking the size of his business.
Clearing weeds is taking time as they are mainly creeping thistle or stinging nettles. Both need gloves and I am trying to also get the roots. I am trying to compost them down with horse manure.I hope the manure will kind of burn them down as well.
The cherries have started to ripen. A couple had ripened and we tried a couple of the Black Oliver variety which have been the first to ripen, they were delicious. My daughter and son agree. In a couple of weeks the other fruits will ripen. I can see we will have a bumper amount of cherries, plums and apples, probably in that order. However again the pears have been a disappointment, they blossomed well but have not fruited. All the trees are growing well. I'll just have to wait and see about the pears, its still early days.
I have seen more pest damage, on some of the fruit. I have found some insects have eaten into the cherries and I have leaf damage all round.
The recent rain has helped and encouraged growth. The trees have not been affected by the recent very strong winds. Through I have seen some trees nearby which have suffered substantial damage.
One of the swarms is doing well I can see lots of eggs etc, the other is expanding, but slower. All of the original hives still haven't got laying queens, yet and I will have too see how things are this weekend before taking action. I really need to get to grips with record keeping, I now have a couple more hives and its getting harder to remember the situation of all the hives.
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