Winter into Summer

Our activities have shifted from winter discussions to work with our own bees, perhaps queen rearing if the weather improves, and to our informal monthly members’ meetings online. Looking back at our winter season, we had a great range of talks and discussions, many of which were recorded and can be viewed from our member’s pages. Sign on if you are a member and go to Members > SNHBS Talks and Workshops – and if you are not already a member you know what to do! Checkout the multi-contributor meeting on Chalkbrood, the science of Inbreeding in humans, bees and plants, Gabriele Soland’s talk on breeding native honey bees in Switzerland and Ben Harden with his thoughts on Amm. It is wonderful being able to call on such a range of thoughtful people who can contribute insight on conserving native honey bees.

Esteemed members and guests making an appearance from far away – geographically and in time. Special mention for King Charles II of Spain for stopping by from the 17th century.

NATIVES – Saving Scotland’s Original Honey Bees

We are honoured and delighted to have been able to assist Maxim Nekliudov to create his most recent masterpiece – NATIVES: Saving Scotland’s Original Honey Bees. He chronicles our efforts to try to re-establish our native honey bee. It has almost disappeared in most of Scotland in its pure form. In a parallel situation to that of the Scottish wildcats, the main threat to the survival of our dark native honey bees is from non-native stock, their ability to crossbreed with the indigenous subspecies and to do so over relatively long distances.

How do you counter the ever-increasing tide of traded and commercial stocks of other types of honey bee? Some countries in the EU have brought in regulations to control the type of honey bee which you can keep in large regions to ensure that they do not lose their native type to hybridisation. In Scotland we have one protected offshore island with pure native honey bees where this precious resource was set up, gained its protection and continues to thrive thanks to the efforts of one brave soul making his living from oysters and bees. How can we improve the situation and make more parts of Scotland a safe place for our native honey bee? Maxim documents our views on why conservation like this is important, on what we are starting to try to do to rejuvenate the type, on the long history of Colonsay as a home for the dark native honey bee (or ‘black bee’) and Andrew’s journey as he established the reserve. Maxim followed our visit to Colonsay where we started our own attempts to apply instrumental insemination as the best means of controlling matings in our native honey bee.

Maxim’s film is a delightful watch. Settle yourself down with a drink of your choice to experience his magical eye for atmosphere, for spotting the key moments, gently alluding to the characters involved, and for sneaking in his quirky sense of humour. The writer is going to call him The Bear from now on, not that this gentle, perceptive artist is anything other than the opposite in real life. Fifty minutes of the best videography around.

Free to view on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdS-_hfhc-o

Dan Basterfield – Simple Queen Raising

SNHBS Zoom Meeting: Monday, 11 September at 7:30pm.

We’re delighted to be starting our series of winter talks and workshops this season with a talk from Daniel Basterfield on Simple Queen Raising. Daniel and his father Ken have been running their Devon-based Blackbury Bee Farm since 2010 and are both well-known tutors in bee education. Daniel recently published the best guide around on ‘Using Apideas’.

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Forging Links in Lothian and the Borders

[I apologise for the very late publishing of Kate’s post about the Lothian and Borders Breeding Group.   Perhaps this can serve as a reminder that it soon will be time for all of us to think about next year’s breeding programme.  We  look forward to hearing more from the Lothian and Borders Group.
Kitta   7 December 2019]

13 April 2019:

Four members of SNHBS met in Humbie, East Lothian today to look at ways of working together to promote A.m.m. bees in the area south of Edinburgh. On the agenda were group aims, bee breeding and queen rearing techniques, skills development needs, access to suitable areas for mating apiaries and protocols for the use of such apiaries by members of the group. Continue reading “Forging Links in Lothian and the Borders”

SNHBS at the Royal Highland Show – June 2019

With the agreement of the SBA’s Events Committee, a small area of the Honey Tent at this year’s Royal Highland Show was made available to the Scottish Native Honey Bee Society for a promotional stand.  In the three to four weeks before the show, the trustees put together a presentation to fill the allocated space.  Our stand proved to be good enough to attract Countryfile presenter, Ellie Harrison, who stopped by for this promotional photo opportunity with SNHB trustee, Sandy Scott.

Scottish Native Honey Bee Society Annual Meeting – 30 March 2019

Over 70 members attended our 3rd Annual Meeting (again at  Loch Leven Community Campus, Kinross), renewing friendships and meeting fellow beekeepers who shared their passion for the native honey bee. Andrew Abrahams and Dylan Elen were our guest speakers while Gavin Ramsay (SNHBS chair) gave the latest news on the Conservation Project and led the business meeting.

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