Frost but beautiful + Bees on farming today

I was down at the orchard yesterday and went early in the morning so I could check on the trees covered in frost.

It was cold but beautiful. I will let the pictures do the talking.

Icicles on branches

frosty

Frost covered tree

Frost covered leave

On the issues, side mind, the ground was too cold to do any weeding and the rabbits have been gnawing trees again. Those darn rabbits. I need to spend more time getting protecting the trees. The trees affected were protected by rabbit guards I made initially when experimenting with home made rabbit guards. Since then I have made them longer and they normally stop rabbits getting to the trees.

Water frozen with plants peeping through

The ground has absorbed much at the water and with the frost around it looks like all the water has disappeared, I found and crushed various bits of ice where the water had frozen it does make for nice pictures though.

Gnawed Tree Bark 

Because I have let the grass grow long and let it  fall down naturally, the worms should consume it and bring the nutrients down into the soil. It should also help with the recent flooding.

On the BBC Farming today program they had a whole program on bees today and highlighted some of the issues. The lack of food, the use of chemicals by farmers and the reduced honey harvest this year. I have been lucky and did have some honey and I have had some labels printed to sell the honey a couple of jars are show in the picture. The proceeds of the sale will go to buy more supplies for the bees and perhaps some equipment. Lets see how much I manage to sell.

My Jars of honey

More horses have been into the orchard, I can see this from the foot prints and the manure on the orchard floor, but they haven't harmed the trees. I need to block of the fence and talk to Chris about this.