The Bees at Wardley Hall Go from Strength to Strength

Monday 26th October 2020

David Crowe from Manchester & District Beekeepers Association provides an update on the bees at the Laudato Si Centre, Wardley Hall

This year has been very rewarding for the bees at Wardley Hall.

Last year, we went into winter with 2 colonies of bees. When the bees came out of winter, we discovered we had lost one hive and the other was not as strong as we hoped.  Our weak colony has progressed to be the best in the apiary and has produced most of the honey that we have harvested.

During the year we were asked to attend Wythenshawe park as the tree surgeon had a bees nest in a tree they were felling. Off we went and retrieved the bees with the queen and brought them back to Wardley Hall.

These bees, that are now fondly named the “Tree Bees”, were in good health and have produced a second colony of bees.

So last year we went into winter with 2 colonies and this year we have 3. Each colony has been left with one super box of stores (honey) for them to feed on over winter.

Now back to the honey; we have extracted 121lbs of honey this year, compared with about 44lbs last year.

We must thank our sponsors, Life for a Life, that made available funds to purchase the extraction equipment. This has made the task so easy to do compared to last year when we had to use a number of different bits of kit to achieve the same result.

Tagged | Environment | Laudato Si Centre