Isn't the sunshine wonderful? Well, it is in north east Essex. I believe it was cold and gloomy in Aberdeen. We had warm air, with a sprinkling of Sahara dust on the cars to prove it, and gentle sunshine, with a breeze so light that the wind turbine on the neighbouring farm gave up.
I went and bought a bootful of bags of spent mushroom compost, just to keep me going. It was a leisurely purchase, since the senior member of the family who runs our friendly local garden centre came over for a chat. He initially recognised me without being able to place me, and I ceased filling bags while we established that I really did want mushroom compost and not something else, and precisely where I lived and what sort of soil I had. He used to deliver loads of chopped bark to us, many years ago, and I think he is the father of the woman who gave us a bulk discount when we took the truck up to buy compost a few weeks back. I now know that she lives in Wivenhoe, and think I have discovered her name, unless I have got hold of the wrong end of the stick. Local mushroom compost for local people.
After lunch I went to open up the bees, as it was more than warm enough. Two colonies are building nicely. They were the result of splitting the fastest-growing and earliest swarming colony last year, so they have good increase in their blood, though already the bees in the two hives look different, one having more fat, golden bees, and the other more small, dark ones. A third colony was not going quite so fast as I would have expected, and I wondered whether I should take a sample and have it tested for one of the diseases that can cause slow build-up. On the other hand, they were slow to get going last year, and I got a crop eventually. There was no sign of chalk brood, a fungal infection that has plagued them in the wet years. The last colony had no queen, when I checked on a warm day in mid March, and I am moderately optimistic that they might have made themselves a new one from the frame of fresh eggs and young brood I gave them. I didn't see her, but the cells in the centre of that frame were polished as if ready for laying. And they seemed in a good mood, whereas colonies without a queen tend to be aimless and tetchy. I shall see.
In the latter part of the afternoon when the Systems Administrator got back from a walk, I actually stopped gardening, and we sat under the great white cherry, Prunus 'Tai-haku'. After getting on for twenty years it really is big enough to sit under. When first planted it was almost dwarfed by the bench next to it, and for a few years under that you had to use your imagination, because even when your head was under the canopy your legs still stuck out, but by now it is a proper umbrella, the bench nestling at the heart of it and looking quite small.
It is a good tree for sitting under, having a spreading habit. The flowers are individually large, and are held in big clusters that tend to face downwards, so that from underneath you can stare up into them, outlined today against a pure blue sky. They are very attractive to bees as well as us, and so the whole tree hums gently. I pruned a few of the lower branches last summer, so that the SA would be able to get under it on the lawnmower without being smacked in the face, and there is now just the right amount of headroom, enclosing but not oppressive. The SA is attached to it in memory of his late father, who planted one in their garden when the SA was very little. I like ours because it is so beautiful, and the spreading shape works very well as a fulcrum where we have it towards the centre of the garden, with grass and borders curving around it.
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