All a buzzz in the nature reserve!
Buttercup field, Bulbarrow Hill in the distance
Hello
It’s been a busy month so far, on the 5th of May we held a little office opening party here at Naish Farm and a great time was had by all, it was lovely to see so many friendly faces from the community showing their support.
Our new office is an old mobile classroom that was kindly donated to us by Bishops Caundle Primary School, the use of this new super duper space means our old office – (which was once a pig sty) can now be turned into our Bee Involved community recourse centre.
This hard working space will house a reference library, nature table, local food sampling area, a real tree ! – showing the 4 seasons, interactive activities for children – making bird feeders/ planting vegetable seeds.
We plan to invite groups of children to come along, tour the bakery and nature reserve, sample our local suppliers produce, watch craft demostrations and learn about the symbiotic relationships between traditional crafts, local food production, conservation how they are all entertwined and how they can get involved.
The bird life here at our gluten free bakery has been extraordinary, we have Sparrows and blue tits nesting at the back of the farm house, sparrows ( thinking about nesting!) in the box with the camera a wren in the garage and the swallows have been checking out the barn again, although I saw on the news this morning that the swallows and martins are having a hard time at the moment – because they build their nests from wet mud they have been struggling to find any following the recent dry period, so the RSPB are urging people to put out trays of wet mud, to give them a helping hand.
Check out http://www.honeybuns.co.uk/joaneycam/ to see Mr and Mrs sparrow busy at work nest building!
We heard our first cuckoo in the nature reserve a couple of weeks ago, on a recent walk near Studland beach I saw two cuckoos flying in the woodland – these birds are becoming quite rare so it was good to see them.
I love this country saying about the cuckoo;
The Cuckoo comes in April
He sings his song in May
In the middle of June he changes his tune
In July he flies away!
Work on the vegetable patch is coming along nicely, we have purple sprouting broccoli, radish, beans, carrots, tomatoes, beetroot coming on in the poly tunnel all soon to be planted out into the raised bed.
We are running a team sunflower growing competiton at the moment,the prize being a luxury hamper and the Honeybuns Biggest Sunflower Cup’
Its getting very competitive already – as the first shoots are starting to come through there is talk of sabotage amongst the camp!
If this goes well prehaps next year we can run a Pumpkin growing competition !
Anyhow bye for now, must pop off and do my watering!
Thanks for reading folks
Charlotte x
Solitary Bee Box on the sunny Bee shack wall
