Category Archives: Beekeeping

Fruitfields 2022 pre-apple blossom update

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The cherry and pear blossom is in full bloom at Fruitfields and beautiful. We’ve already enjoyed the apricot, greengage and early willow catkins and blackthorn blossom.

Our Fruitfields honeybees have been bringing in the pollen from these different trees and shrubs, which varies in colour as they transport it in their ‘paniers’ back to our Fruitfields beehives. We have started our Fruitfields bee experiences this year and are now fully booked through to the end of the year. We do love introducing people to our Fruitfields honeybees.

We have ‘blossom walks’ and open afternoons taking place on Friday 6th and Saturday 7th May. All are welcome and we will be selling our cider, apple juice and honey from our orchard. There is no parking but it is an excellent walk or cycle from the canal or Upper Bittell reservoir.

Over the last 3 months we have pruned the whole of our plot closest to the reservoir. As a result we hope to have given these trees the best chance of a bumper fruit crop. We’ll see!

 

Summer & Autumn 2021 at Fruitfields

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It has been a mixed summer. Quite dry but not a huge amount of sunshine. Both our apple and honey crops have been reasonable. Everything has cropped late this year and the cider apples and later apple varieties are still being harvested.

We have been hugely thankful to family and friends and local supporters. Much of the apple juice process relies on bodies (unless you completely mechanize for thousands and thousands of pounds) to help with apple picking, apple washing, milling, pressing the pulp and tanking the apple juice prior to bottle filling and pasteurising. These helpers have made the harvest relatively easy this year and helped with various other projects.

We continued the bee experiences over the Summer which were extremely enjoyable (I think we just had one experience of an elusive queen) and these experiences ensure we are not complacent with our amazing honeybees.

We had tree work completed in our coppice by Hopwood Tree Surgeons who have made safe our historic Ash & Oak, we have had School groups and the Scouts to the Orchard as well as the Eventures (Home Schooling) families on three separate occasions.

We continue to relish the onset of Autumn and the literal ‘fruits of our labours’. We had the first good crop of ‘William Crumps’ apples (a Worcester Pearmain/Cox cross) which bode well for future years and the best year ever for our Pitmaston Pineapples.

We enjoyed our open day in the rain in early September. Well done to the brave souls who joined us and we look forward to the pre-Christmas stalls over the next couple of months. A good year through to harvest. Thankyou to all of Fruitfields supporters.

& we launched our Fruitfields cider. Check out our online shop!

Many of the pressing, milling & bottling crew 2021!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bottle Filling

Bottle Levelling

 

 

 

Fruitfields honeybees loving the summer sun.

Glorious Egremont Russets.

Our Red Devils with dragonfly.

Capped frame of honey waiting to be extracted.

Honey frame uncapping.

Fruitfields honeybee swarm collecting.

Bottles!

Fruitfields cider

The launch of our 500ml Fruitfields Cider bottle

 

Storage Creation Crew

Chief Panker

One of our Picking days, Autumn 2021

Ready for our Fruitfields Open Day, Autumn 2021

Greg & Sian, Mid-harvest at Tardebigge Cider, 2021

 

 

 

 

 

 

Winter & Spring 2021 at Fruitfields

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We have had a proper Winter with good amounts of snow. Due to the Global Covid Pandemic we have not been able to host our annual Wassail in conjunction with Barnt Green Parish Council or progress our Fruitfields stall at any Farmer’s markets or events. All retail outlets have been closed through to April in line with Government guidelines.

However, positively, the local community have been extremely supportive of our direct delivery of apple juice & honey on Fridays and as the restrictions ease, events are to recommence externally from May 17th and normality should resume from the 21st June (but we will see!).

We managed to prune all our trees from January – March and all but one of our beehive colonies survived the winter. We have re-planted replacement trees where they have succumbed to deer and rabbit damage. We are now enjoying the first of the 2021 blossom and have made a start splitting our beehive colonies and on our ‘bee experiences’ which are proving popular.

We look forward to the summer and seeing the effects of the pollination of the blossom and the fruit buds coming on.

 

2020 at Fruitfields

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What a year it has been at Fruitfields! Despite the challenges of the COVID pandemic, Brexit, the American election and more we are not just surviving but thriving due to focusing on our bees and trees and the support of our apple juice & honey stockists and everyone who has bought our products.

Throughout the Spring and Summer we tended to our fruit trees and beehives. We are pleased to have doubled the number of honeybee hives we have and our fruit trees are starting to establish themselves. We caught a couple of honeybee swarms at the end of May and one of these stocks has become quite prolific with a strong laying queen. We cross fingers they over winter well.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

During mid-summer we took advantage of the season, and were able to carry out a great amount of work in the orchard soon after sunrise. We have always thought it a stunning location with the combination of the North Worcestershire Countryside and Upper Bittell Reservoir adding to the surroundings.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We have been able to develop some nucleus bees from splitting our existing beehive colonies to help prevent swarming and to grow the number of colonies we have. It has been good to pass on beekeeping skills and introduce members of the public to our honeybees via our beekeeping experiences.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From August on-wards we have been extremely busy with the harvest. Starting with the extraction of our Fruitfields honey in August before apple picking throughout late August, September and October. Having picked the apples we then wash, mill and press the fruit before bottling and pasteurising the apple juice.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We are part of an amazing local community. Apple pickers included friends and colleagues, the Barnt Green Girl Guides and many families, individuals and members of the network of villages which we form a part.

We used the facilities at Tardebigge Cider in order to scale up our position to process the 5 tonnes of apples collected.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We have also invested in bottles fillers and our own mill and hydropress which give us the ability to process smaller runs of apple juice such as a limited number of pink juice using a single variety called ‘Red Devil’. From our harvest this year we are delighted as a business to now be offering the following products:

A medium sweet apple juice (Made from Browns & Dabinett)

A medium sharp apple juice (Made from Bramley, Sandlin Duchess & Ashmeads Kernel)

A single variety Ashmeads Kernel apple juice

A single variety Red Devil apple juice

Honey in both 1 lb and 8 oz jars and either liquid or soft set. All these products are subject to availability!

Summer & Autumn at Fruitfields

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It has been a fun summer tending to the trees and making sure they are well staked. We continue to check that our growing apples are bug and disease free and that our bees have the best possible chance to develop and be strong enough to gather nectar to make honey.

High winds and gales and our lack of thinning the apples have meant for a couple of broken apple tree limbs but this has provided a lessen for thinning apples in oncoming years.

Highlights of the summer have included running beekeeping experiences and being up close and personal with the bees. This has been sooo much fun and it is great to introduce new people to the life and setup of the honeybee.

Our apple varieties are coming on now. We have had small crops of Redditch Doddin & Pitmaston Pineapple as earlies and the Worcester Pearmains, William Crumps and other varieties such as Red Devil, Sandlin Duchess and Ashmead’s Kernel are on the way.

 

Storms before the calm? March 2019 in the UK

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We’ve had a few weeks now of rain, wind and challenging conditions here in North Worcestershire in the UK. We are hoping this is the ‘storm before the calm’ and all settles down for the main blossom and pollination period in May.

Pictures speak a thousand words and we have at last worked out why our fruity pictures from last season would not upload (pixel size). Therefore we are pleased to share with you some of the pictures from the 2018 harvest and from the last few months. We have been busy pruning the trees, cutting our willow and selling our apple juice and honey through local stockists.

If you want to contact us please look at our facebook site @fruitfieldsjuice

What crazy weather & a quick check on my starving bees (despite trying to feed them)

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Ok we’ve had snow and sledged and snow and sledged and yes more snow and sledged. It was fun the first couple of times. We’d prefer it if there was not a Beast from the East 3 and my bees, the only colony that has survived (colony 2 succumbed to starvation last week despite candy and fondant feeding) is needing a warm spring now and for the flowers to come out, please!

So it was important today to see if there were any stores in the remaining hive and it’s confirmed that the bees are on a knife edge and the candy is essential. Also essential is the local forage including early cherry blossom and willow catkins.

I had an accomplice today which meant some great bee frame close ups could be taken which clearly show the different stages of bee development from upright matchstick eggs in cells (up to day 3) to curly pearly white larvae, to sealed brood waiting to hatch. You can see bees with the yellow pollen on their back legs in their ‘paniers’ to feed to the young brood for their development.

 

Why we put mouse excluders on our bee hives!

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When carrying out our recent winter preparation for the beehives we had a little surprise hiding in the two polynucs. On opening them up, we discovered two mice families.Each mouse family was very warm and cosy and had decided which corner of the nucleus box they were going to the toilet in! Can you see our cheeky friends in the pictures?!