Heather starting to flower.

hallshoney said:

Mine on the edge of a large patch of heather (about 200 acres )
seem to be flying in the oposit direction. Although there is a lot of rosebay willow herb in full flower as well.

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Plenty of Rosebay here, but bees not interested in it at all, many are however working well on the sweet chestnut, hundreds of chestnut trees around here.

When we kept bees years ago they would bring in heather from about ½ mile away, I was wondering wether to as the farmer if we could put them closer. Heather here is on the side on a mountain so there in no practical way we can put them directly on it.

Plenty of Rosebay down here but not being touched by my bees, first Ling is showing and Bell has been out for several weeks now. At the moment Bramble seems to be yielding well, with the lower temperatures.

took first van load of bees to the heather, bell full out ling just coming into flower. colonies are strong with plenty of brood and bees but the main thing is a complete lack of stores in brood chamber. Supers which were nearly full a fortnight ago are almost empty. Had to feed syrup before moving the hives to Heather.

Checked on some hives near Abergavenny this morning, not much in flower but it has progressed over the last week. Swapped in some brood frames full of stores and left hopeful that the warmer weather due next week materialises. Most colonies had some nectar in the supers but very very little in the brood chamber.

There's a privet hedge not far from my urban hives, on the edge of a building site, so it's not been pruned. It's in full flower, and covered in bees. In the other direction is an former playing field covered in brambles and thistles. that's getting a lot of attention from bees too. And beyond that is some Himalayan balsam that the balsam bashers have not been able to get at. So the town bees have plenty to go at. It's my rural apiary that I'm worrying about. Once the brambles have stopped flowering there may not be much left till the ivy comes on song.

I was told by an experienced heather honey beekeeper that's its pointless bringing your bees to heather unless the heather is managed to encourage new growth by burning the ground every now and again. It was stated bringing bees to old heather is a complete waste of time and seeing how stressful it is on a colony should not be done unless you know the area of forage is a managed one.

Hivemaker. said:

Plenty of Rosebay here, but bees not interested in it at all, many are however working well on the sweet chestnut, hundreds of chestnut trees around here.

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I thought Sweet Chestnuts flowered in spring, as this time of year you can actually see the chestnuts, we collect them here in Sept/Oct.

nantmoel said:

I thought Sweet Chestnuts flowered in spring, as this time of year you can actually see the chestnuts, we collect them here in Sept/Oct.

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There is an avenue of them near where I used to live in Cumbria and they flowered in July. Long big catkin-like flowers. Bees love them

Beecarer said:

I was told by an experienced heather honey beekeeper that's its pointless bringing your bees to heather unless the heather is managed to encourage new growth by burning the ground every now and again. It was stated bringing bees to old heather is a complete waste of time and seeing how stressful it is on a colony should not be done unless you know the area of forage is a managed one.

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Like many oft repeated opinions, this one is largely nonsense. Some of our best heather sites are in open forest. Not been a fire in some of those for 300 years.

I heard this one so many times when I was younger, and only by experimenting with other places did I find out for sure that there is very little basis to it.

Maybe it's a ploy to keep hobbyists out?

Into the lions den said:

Like many oft repeated opinions, this one is largely nonsense. Some of our best heather sites are in open forest. Not been a fire in some of those for 300 years.

I heard this one so many times when I was younger, and only by experimenting with other places did I find out for sure that there is very little basis to it.

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I hear the do it in Scotland so the Grouse can feed on the young shoots, the heather here used to yield loads of honey years ago, I'll just have to wait and see if it the same.

when the heather gets burnt here in the mournes it never seems to grow back, grass and bracken are up like a shot and seem to choke it out .

Darren

biglongdarren said:

when the heather gets burnt here in the mournes it never seems to grow back, grass and bracken are up like a shot and seem to choke it out .

Darren

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Getting similar here the heather being choked out by the gorse and bracken. The national trust haven't done any burning for along time and won't let the tenants either

hallshoney said:

The national trust haven't done any burning for along time and won't let the tenants either

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They do here, well rather the national park do, they went back to controlled burning of different sections of heather moorland every year a few years ago now, after many years of not bothering.

Into the lions den said:

Like many oft repeated opinions, this one is largely nonsense. Some of our best heather sites are in open forest. Not been a fire in some of those for 300 years.

I heard this one so many times when I was younger, and only by experimenting with other places did I find out for sure that there is very little basis to it.

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Thanks for clearing that up, I guess as much as anything they forage on, it all depends on the weather if its a great sunshine filled summer/autumn you get a great harvest if its not then you wont?

hallshoney said:

Getting similar here the heather being choked out by the gorse and bracken. The national trust haven't done any burning for along time and won't let the tenants either

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Its said leipreacháns have been known to start the fires over here from time to time, do ye not have any similar mischievous little critters ye can blame for starting the fires?

Beecarer said:

Thanks for clearing that up, I guess as much as anything they forage on, it all depends on the weather if its a great sunshine filled summer/autumn you get a great harvest if its not then you wont?

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We choose a wide variety of locations for the heather to spread the risk. There have been many seasons...the windier ones especially, where we have been saved by the sheltered old forest areas. There is a grain of truth to the managed moors story however, as the banding of different ages of heather can also extend the flowering period and gives a longer window to get a crop if any weather comes along, and the forest areas tend (but not always) to be a week or so later than the open moors. We only need a week at the heather time and we make our costs for the whole year.

The mix of old and young heather is indeed for grouse especially, young shoots for food, older heather for cover. Not many grouse in the forest places.

Suspect this season we are wasting our time even going given the forecast. It is getting truly desperate now, as some have been sitting on beautiful bell heather for at least three weeks and have brought in precisely zero, and are starving.

Anyone know of places with a few hundred hectares of water lilies?


ps. If you look in the photo album I put on here on 2/08/2012 there are one or two pics of the open forest areas with a major heather component. We use many such places and actually many denser areas that those, and the mix of dappled shade with open glades is actually great as the heather can be in flower over a very long period, glades first and shaded later.

The heather is burnt to make small new shoots for young grouse to feed as all ready said but also it stop the moor turning back to woodland and it would start out Turing to silver birch and then oak woodland this is why a old established woodland will have heather in the ground cover I was trained as a game keeper there is a art to burning get it wrong and you get grass and bracken growing not heather sounds like this is happening in some parts heather here is just starting to flower on the first few plants so will be taking hives Friday night for there holiday to the moors

ITLD, sorry but no acres of waterlillies in Worcestershire for you. How about Himalayan Balsam? Ogmore valley has acres, I've heard and readers may know of large areas nearer you in the Grampians? Temperature in Rothiemurchus over next 10 days stuck in the range of 15-17C, I see on the BBC. Yes risk mitigation opportunities must be quite limited in a given locality and constrained by cost of moving far enough to get better weather. Mid Wales is at last seeing forecasts of temperatures in high teens to low 20s, hope for some flow starting. Only 450 miles south of your heather sites! I'll keep fingers crossed for a better outlook in Scotland.