Geoff gets a Mystery Swarm…

On Sunday May 16th, on a day of light rain with clear intervals and a few minutes after leaving to walk the short distance home, Jannice who had been trimming my beard phoned to report a swarm on the outside of my boundary fence, which runs alongside the pavement of a side road.

Showing considerable initiative, she also took a photograph of the swarm.

Being helpless in such a situation, I rang Stuart who arrived in rapid time and quickly brushed the swarm into a nucleus box and was away, even declining the offer of a beer, leaving me to ponder on the sequence of events.

The following morning at 7.30 a.m. the four colonies in the back garden were checked by Stuart and pronounced to be queen right, so they weren’t the culprits.

Jannice would claim that there was no swarm on the fence when she walked past the first time, when the usual light rain had come to an end. Thirty five minutes later, the swarm was on the fence and one hour later, the rain was teeming down.

There are no beekeepers in the vicinity and one would not expect bees to be swarming within the weather pattern at that time. A mystery indeed.

One can only speculate what might have been the possible outcome when children and mothers would have been within touching distance of the of the swarm when walking to Primary school the following morning…

Geoff Hopkinson BEM NDB

My ‘No Mow May’ Lawn

You ‘may’ recall that in the last Newsletter we asked you not to mow your lawn during May 2021 to celebrate World Bee Day which fell on May 20th 2021.

Not mowing your lawn allows a diversity of wild flowers to grow, like dandelion and white clover.

This benefits all pollinating insects including honey bees who gather the nectar and pollen.

Below you can see how some of our club members lawns looked when they were not
mowed for a month or probably longer in most cases as the weather was so cold
and wet at the time.

The top row shows Alan’s, Stuart’s and Jo’s lawns after weeks of being left to their own devices.

Stuart finally resorted to cutting paths in the grass so he could get around his garden.
The photograph at the bottom of the page shows an area of Kate and Charles’ garden that was left to grow as it liked. I think that you will agree that it looks very pretty and not at all like some of the others. Have you got a picture of your lawn to show us?

  • Alan’s lawn
  • Stuart’s lawn
  • Jo’s lawn
  • Kate and Charles’ garden

New beekeepers start practical sessions

This year’s intake of new beekeepers had completed their six weeks theory sessions via Zoom and were ready to get to grips with the practical aspects of beekeeping by meeting the bees for the first time at Shugborough.

Because of Covid-19 we could only have a maximum of 30 people gathering together at the same time.

So the new beekeepers were split into a Tuesday evening group and a Saturday morning group.

This still allowed for a support team of tutors and helpers to be in attendance on both days.


June 1st was the first time that anybody other than the small apiary work group teams had attended the Shugborough apiary since late 2019.

We set up a makeshift camp of chairs on the small car park at the entrance to the apiary so that our new beekeepers could change into their bee suits and listen to the safety information and get their first try at lighting smokers.

Tuesday 1st June group

It was a bit chaotic at times as we adapted to the new working conditions but everybody got stuck in.

The following Saturday we met up with the other group of beginners but this time we were a bit more organised and had more chairs thanks to Phil who collected them from our Hilton Green apiary.

Saturday 5th June group

Thank you to all the new beekeepers for bearing with us and a big thank you to the club members who supported and continue to support our new beekeepers.

The beginner practical sessions continue on Tuesdays and Saturdays for the next few weeks.

Given that we can meet together in bigger groups, the apiary will then be open to all members on Saturday mornings until the end of the season.

Items for the newsletter

If you have any stories, pictures or information that you would like included in the newsletter, or if you have items for sale or wish to comment on the content of previous newsletters, please send to: ssbka-mail@southstaffsbeekeepers.com and make
the subject “Item for the newsletter”.

‘My Apiary’ – Steve Gibbins

Last summer Barry Crossley made the great suggestion that we show each
other pictures of our hives and apiaries in the Newsletter. In the July 2020 edition we featured some members’ apiaries.

We have had lots of enthusiastic comments from members wanting to see more views of apiaries and the sort of places we keep our bees.

So as we all love to see how the other half keep their bees here is another members’ apiary for you to admire.

Thanks to new club member, Steve Gibbins, for sharing his apiary with us. Steve says that this was during a time of high water and that it does not normally look like this. He adds that the bees don’t appear to be affected by it. Note the handy storage locker that he stores his spare equipment and tools in.

So come on, why not join in and share a photograph of your hives or apiary with your fellow beekeepers?

Send your apiary images to agreenman219@ gmail.com for inclusion in the next newsletter.