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I've had a disaster, first time for this: bees in one hive starved in spite of having fondant in the hive. Is it possible that my homemade fondant was too hard for them to access?

JBM's method by far the easiest - put a clean bb on brood chamber, when queen goes up and is happy laying , reverse the boxes with qe between. They'll clear the stores upstairs and you can remove the lower box when all brood has emerged. I've never quite understood all that faffing around with...

No,Fian, it's between £1.60 and £1.70 for a 454g jar.

I've just looked online. There is at least one company advertising there which says it pasteurises its honey to remove yeasts that might cause the honey to ferment. I know this is a contentious subject but it makes me so angry that small beekeepers are chastised while almost every supermarket...

I'm wondering why "raw' is such a boo word when used to describe honey. To me it means not pasteurised, (please correct me if I'm wrong) which, I believe is what happens to most store-bought 'pure' honeys.

Thank you, guys. I have been helping with a tbh and found that they've not been doing well. I'd always wondered about them in our cold climate because they are so shallow. The long deep seems a much better alternative.

Lots of orange and greyish-white pollen coming in.

For retail sales I'd only use new jars, but my personal customers are happy to pay slightly less for their honey if they return the jars. They approve of recycling. I explain that I put the jars through the dishwasher on the highest temp, then into the oven foe 10 mins at 150c. I know they think...

Dear Enrico That last post of yours brought back the same memories - intense moments of happiness and more or less painful learnings of the last 25 years. The only moment I'd add is watching a small grandchild watching a new bee chew her lid off and struggle out of her cell in her new furry...

And on and on and on about the illegality of calling honey "pure" or "raw" when every supermarket in the land describes their 454g for £1.80 jars as "pure and natural" honey.

In Oxford today - the forsythia in full flower in the garden.

And, of course, used cloths or kitchen towels stiff with wax residue are excellent for lighting fires.

Thank you Eric and Peter for that brilliant list. Wax also useful for escaping sirens. Judy

I contacted my local carpet shop and asked whether they had any small-sized offcuts of woollen carpets I could buy. They'd just thrown out a skipful, were very pleased to think that pieces big enough to cover a crown board could be useful and are looking out some unwanted woollen carpet samples...

I had one of these bumblebees this summer -assumed she couldn't find her way out again. It looked as though d=the bees had coated her in propolis to prevent her rotting. Is this correct? Like the Egyptian queens?

I think it's a stag beetle - the horns.

Gorgeous.

What paint did you use?

I wonder whether you local beekeeping association runs an auction of secondhand equipment. Our, the SBKA has an annual auction and buying there cuts costs significantly.

I'd like to paint my lifts in jolly colours this spring. what paint wd you recommend?