The Grand Staircase.

When I first saw this walled garden – known as the “Lost Garden” – this view did not exist. The wall and staircase in the middle distance was completely overgrown and took a considerable effort to clear, while the trees on either side of the path are overgrown Christmas trees that didn’t reach the market before the garden became derelict. Volunteers are slowly bringing it back into cultivation while my bees are tucked away in a nice sunny corner in the shelter of those trees.
 
We’ve been having some very nice weather this week and today I was free to go and annoy the bees. It is the perceived wisdom that those colonies that don’t make it through the winter finally pop their clogs in March and April; the theory being that they start raising brood during early warm spells in anticipation of plenty of forage becoming available - which then fails to materialise. I have received several emails recently, from beekeeping authorities, warning that there have been many colony losses so far this year from starvation for just that reason. As a precaution, my bees were fed a month ago but have refused to accept it; they’re sensible, if it’s a choice between nice fresh nectar and my grotty sugar syrup, they’ll take the nectar – thank you very much, and that’s what they’ve been doing. Of course, Britain has a multitude of different local weather conditions and the plants that do well vary from place to place and from year to year; thus bees at Newbattle, several miles, away have been gratefully accepting the beekeepers’ offerings even though it is difficult to see that there is any significant difference in the habitat between there and Penicuik.