Help the Bumblebee!

People in usual have a soft spot for the bumblebee - that little plump creature is forever fighting with its helter-skelter way of flying while it is humming so lovely - a symbol of a sunny day in the garden or a summer day out in the country.

When the bumblebee-queen wakes from her winter sleep, it is early spring. The bumblebee endures low temperatures better than the honeybee, but in many places the cultural landscape is a problem for the bumblebee. It has lost terrain because of corn crops, lesser and lesser windbreaks and almost no earth banks or stone fences , which means that the bumblebee has been declining during the last decades.

A garden owner is able to help the bumblebee to get started in the early spring by i.e. planting Goat willow, crocus, Christmas rose and early flowering heather, which is good food for the bumblebee in the early spring. Nest-places can be established by leaving part of a woodpile or a bundle of twigs - or maybe build a small stone fence in the garden. A nesting box for the tit with a hole of two centimeters diameter could be a fine home for the bumble bee.

Source: Natur og Miljø, Nr. 1 March 2010, article by Jan Skriver.


Bumblebee with flower dust on its back.

photo : grethe bachmann

Common Snowdrop / Almindelig Vintergæk

Galanthus nivalis


Snowdrop, (Danish Vintergæk), was named the Morning Star among winter flowers. It arrives early, trickeling up through the snow already in February or even before if the winter is mild. But it is a flower of the cold winter months, it has gone before spring takes a serious hold.

Snowdrop is a low bulp-plant, ab. 10-20 cm high. The yellow-green shoots are the first showing above the soil. In the shoot are both two leaves and one flower. The white bell-shaped flowers last about one month, but there might be flowers from February till April dependent on the course of winter and the placement of the bulbs in the garden.

Snowdrop thrives best in moist, nutrient-rich humus, where it comes back year after year. If the bulbs are in the lawn, it is important that they are allowed to die down, before the lawn is mowed the first time or else the bulb cannot gather enough nourishment till next year. The fastest way to grow new snowdrops is to have a lump of bulbs from friends or family. It is easy to move the lump with flowers, if they are moved in a whole lump and plant in the same depth. Or of course buy bulbs and put them in the soil in 5-10 cm's depth during autumn.



Snowdrop is propagated from seed or sidebulbs. That's why a group of snowdrops grow bigger each year. After they have ceased to flower they can be increased in numbers when dividing the bulbs carefully, and since they do not endure drying they have to be plant the same day. If sidebulbs are placed in the garden in various places it takes two years before they are big enough to flower. A snowdrop can also be propagated by the seeds, it takes ab. 4 years before there is a bulb able to set flowers. The seed-propagating is done by nature itself, but if snowdrops emerge in strange places, then it might be the ants or mice who move seeds and bulbs.

There are ab. 14 various snowdrops. The most common sorts are all Galanthus nivalis. They look alike but have various green markings upon the white flower-head. A few are different like Galanthus nivalis Plenus with filled flowers, Galanthus nivalis ssp Reginaeolgae, which flowers in autumn. The last mentioned looks like the common snowdrop but has shorter petals, and the flowerbells have a green horseshoe-shaped marking.

Very different are Maximus with larger flowers, Lutescus with yellow markings on the petals and Pictur with green spots upon outer and inner petals. These relatives come especially from Turkey. Most of them are delicate towards hard winters.

Snowdrop is closely connected to a Danish tradition about writing gækkebreve. A snowdrop, fresh or dried, is put together with a finely cut letter. The sender writes his/her name with dots and adds a small verse, and then it's up to the receiver to guess from whom the letter comes. If this is not solved the receiver has to give the sender an Easter egg.

Snowdrops kan be put indoors for earlier flowering -  dig up a lump when the shoot is traceable, plant it in a pot and place it as cool as possible. As soon as the flowers have withered they can be plant in the garden again.

For the fun of it can coloured ink be added to the water in a vase with snowdrops, and in a few hours the petals will be red, green or blue etc. In a vase or pot with full-blown snowdrops their heads will close if they are put in a cool place.

It is important to let the green leaves stay on the withered flowers. The green gathers nourishment for the next years' blooming. This goes for both snowdrops and other bulb-plants.

The plant was also used in folk medicine. It contains an active substance called galanthamine, which can be helpful in the treatment of Alzheimer's disease, though it is not a cure.

It is useful as a bee-plant because of its early flowering and it gives much nectare but only a little pollen.

The generic name tagalanthus from the Greek gala (milk) and anthos (flower), was given to the genus by Carl Linnaeus in 1735. He described Galanthus nivalis in his Species Plantarum published in 1753. The epithet "nivalis" means "of the snow", referring either to the snow-like flower or the plant's early flowering. The common name snowdrop first appeared in the 1633 edition of John Gerard's Great Herbal . Other British traditional common names include February Fairmaids, Dingle-Dangle, Candlemas bells, Mary's tapers and in parts of Yorkshire Snow Pierces (like the French name perce-neige).

Source: Anemette Olesen, Idényt.


photo Forsthaven: grethe bachmann

Month of May - Sweet and Mild

The month of May is sweet and mild with soft green hills and light green leaves,
sparkling yellow in the sunlight.

"Bright coinage by the generous sun
Down flung and scattered one by one..."

says a poem by Andrew Downing.¨¨

Horse and cattle are out in the fields again, enjoying the good weather I suppose. They almost alway join each other in a flock -  they are social  animals. I feel so sorry for a lonely horse in a field.

These horses are grazing in a beautiful place. I wonder if they do observe that?

Three photos from Nationalpark Mols Bjerge

Just take a look at this lovely thick wool of the Galloway cow.


The Galloway cattle is grazing the area of the Molslaboratoriet, owned by Naturhistorisk Museum in Aarhus and a part of the Nationalpark Mols Bjerge.

A sweet little Galloway calf. The Galloway cattle is very peaceful and calm, in fact reserved, they are not interested in us humans, no matter how much we want to "talk with them" - which might be a good thing! They are not curious, they keep away from us, which might prevent some bad experiences,  when we are walking in their fields.

So sweet. What fine eyelashes!

Den italienske sti (The Italian path). Each year I long for a walk along this path, it's a place with lots of plants and animal life, especially many butterflies in summer, but today is still too early. BUT it is a lovely spring day, and the sun is warming my old wintercold bones!

A brimstone in a dandelion

Have you walked beneath the blossoms in the spring?
In the spring
Beneath the apple blossoms in the spring
When the pink cascades are falling
And the silver brooklets brawling
And the cuckoo bird is calling
In the spring

from poem by William Wilsey Martin.

Walking along the Italian Path gives me the feeling that I want this moment to last.....

.....but we drive on and down to the beach  - and we pass one of the pretty buildings, belonging to the Mols Laboratory.

Down by the beach and the clouds and the blue, blue sea........

This cloud is either a duck or a dachshound being chased by a big fish!

A white wagtail playing by the beach...

Genista anglica ( Engelsk Visse) here growing by the coast of East Jutland, common in Mid- and West Jutland (in Denmark).

English names are petty whin, needle furze, needle whin. It is a shrubby flowering plant of the family Fabacea, which can be found growing in Cornwall, Wales and eastern Scotland.





























Goodbye to Mols Bjerge and The Italian Path and the Galloway calf for this time..............



photo Mols/Strandkær 10 May 2014: grethe bachmann 

Spring Signs 2014 and a Tour out.

There are many early signs of spring after this mild month of February.  The marsh harrier has arrived, the white-tailed eagle has started nesting, the skylark is singing, reports have come about the first cranes. There are numbers of snowdrops and eranthis in the garden and the first crocus are on their way up. If the mild weather continues it won't last long before the brimstone butterfly is here. The bumble-bee queen will soon wake up. There is nothing as fine as the sound of the first bumblebee.

G

One of the first signs of spring are the flowers of hazel.









General and usual signs of spring:  

Sweet violet is one of the first flowers in March. The dark violet flower has a wonderful scent and the colour is easy to spot by hedges and glades. It is also called "Mary and the child". If the petals are plucked, a figure is seen, looking like Virgin Mary with Child Jesus.
Lesser celandine is one of our earliest spring plants. The flower has shining yellow petals, and the plant is often called buttercup. Lesser celandine belong to the family Ranunculus like the anemone.
When you see coltsfoot it is a certain sign of spring. Back in school our teacher told us that when we saw the first coltsfoot then it was really spring and we had to bring it to her. Coltsfoot is seen in  road banks, edge of ditches and lakeshores. The leaves have a contour like a little horse hoof.

As soon as the sun brings warmth to a sheltered place, the ant comes out - and the ants clump together upon the anthill. They function like mobile radiators, and they bring warmth down in the hill to the queens.
The brimstone butterfly is another certain sign of spring. The male with the magnificent  lemon-yellow colour is easy to spot in March. The white-yellow female arrives about two weeks later. The brimstone roams far and wide.
The orange-red butterfly, the small tortoiseshell, leaves its overwintering place in April. It is often seen with outspread wings in the warm sun. The small tortoiseshell is Denmark's national butterfly.

In late March and first of April the frog eggs are seen in little lakes and waterholes, the eggs are small transparent lumps with a little black spot in the middle. The frog is fully developed in 85 days, but already after four days it is possible to notice that the black spot has changed.
 
And then there is the sweet little ladybird. We put it on our forefinger and let it crawl up, and we tell this little red thing to fly up to God and ask for good weather - and it flies up!  The ladybird is also very helpful in the garden, fighting the little green mites.

The beautiful sight of the white anemone in the forest floor is magic. The flowers cover the earth before the trees have leaves. This happens in April-May - and when the beech after this beautiful sight shows us another miracle with the new incredible light-green leaves, then it is spring for good.

Nature is magic.

May

photo: grethe bachmann


A short Tour out on 22 February. 

At the end of February 2014 we'll say goodbye to the fifth mildest winter in 140 years.

On Saturday 22 February we went to the east coast of Jutland south of Århus . The weather report had told us that there would be some after effects from the recent storm in the British Isles. The weather was very windy, but also warm and with rainy showers and sunshine, changing all the time. Big black clouds came rushing, followed by rain and  a blue sky.


Here is a little collection of my photos from 22 February: 

Black buzzard

Brown buzzard.

repair after storm in October.

The Bees are buzzing now................

What happens in Spring?


When the temperature is above 7-8 Celsius the bees wake up and start their work. A bee family has about 20.000 working bees in early spring. The bees have been waiting through winter in the beehive and in the center of the bees is the queen, well protected from the cold.



In the first month of spring the bees gather pollen,  especially the yellow catkins of the willows give an important source of protein. If you get a close look at a bee  near a willow tree, you'll see it wearing big pants filled with golden pollen. The bees, who are fed with pollen in spring, are the same who are pollinating the fruit trees in April and May. While gathering pollen the working bees are vey busy, they have to fly 20.000 trips to cover the need of pollen for the beehive. If it is raining, the bees have to use the deposits from the previous years. But when summer arrives they can gather more pollen than they use.

bees gathering water

The Queen bee lays 200 eggs in each 24 hours during April. Almost all eggs are working bees, unfertilized eggs are male bees or drones. They must be hatched in April to reach maturity for the swarming season in May. All the other eggs are female bees, but only the Queen bee can lay eggs.



When summer is near the number of bees in the family have raised till 60.000 -  and with so many bees in the same family, the Queen bee cannot control them anymore. The working bees build one or several special cells - Queen cells. They are larger than the working cells and hang down vertical. The Queen bee lays a common fertilized egg in the queen cells. When the eggs are hatched the larvae is fed with a special fodder - gele royal . This makes the larvae grow fast and be larger than the working bees. The larvae will become a new Queen.

Before the new Queen leaves her cell, the old Queen collects about half her subjects and leaves the beehive - she knows, she will lose to the new Queen if she stays. The old Queen and her following subjects gather in one big brown living lump upon a tree or a branch. During the next many hours some bees fly to and fro the place of residence, they are scouts looking for a new place where the bee family can live. When they come back to the other bees they tell them about their discoveries by dancing a special dance outside the lump. And when many scouts are dancing the same dance, they are telling about the same place. The big swarm flies up again and leaves and the scout bees fly through the swarm again and again to lead them to their new residence.






Source: Naturstyrelsen, Miljøministeriet: Forår, Bierne summer. 

photo: grethe bachmann
photo: yellow flower and bee: stig bachmann nielsen, naturplan.dk