After my first week of bee ownership it was time for my first solo inspection. The idea is to ensure there is a queen and she is laying eggs which are growing into larvae.
There’s so much to learn and although I already have Collins Beekeeper’s Bible I bought a Haynes Manual. The last Haynes Manual I studied was for a Triumph Spitfire.
It’s a very good reference manual and I’m sure it will be well thumbed and probably covered by honey before too long.
So here I am booted and suited inspecting my girls, all 30,000 of them. No I didn’t count them but I’m assured a healthy colony can be anything between 20,000 – 50,000 bees.
There were eggs in some of the cells and larvae and plenty of bees. I’m holding a frame from the middle of the brood box and it is covered in bees. I’m wondering why they are not out foraging.
On the very last frame I found the queen which is always reassuring.
Another first for me was a visit to Kinema in the Woods in Woodhall Spa. I met up with Mary (we are still friends) to see “Yesterday”, a film written by Richard Curtiss and directed by Danny Boyle. This makes it a dream team production.
There have been so many reviews that I won’t be giving anything away by saying the story is told in a time when nobody remembers that the Beetles ever existed apart from one person and when he starts to play some of their music everyone is in awe. A novel idea, well told, very funny and certainly a feel-good movie.
And so to the Kinema in the Woods. I’ve never been before but had heard of it’s quaintness. Well, it is more than quaint. The decor is straight out of the 1950s including ruffled curtains, an interval part way through the film (no need to change reels because it’s digital) and then the awesome organ that rises out of the stage with organist who plays whilst we ate ice cream.
