http://www.slow-life.co.uk Jonathan Denby’s Slow Life blog from the Lake District Mon, 06 Feb 2012 09:21:52 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 en hourly 1 http://www.slow-life.co.uk/2010/11/04/busy-bees/ http://www.slow-life.co.uk/2010/11/04/busy-bees/#comments Thu, 04 Nov 2010 10:10:54 +0000 jonathandenby http://www.slow-life.co.uk/?p=1158
When I had the idea of designing a Beekeeper’s Garden for the Hampton Court Flower Show one of my main aims was to highlight the plight of the bee, whose numbers had been declining for several years. The idea was avidly seized upon by the media and the BBC did a special feature which included an interview with a bee expert, Professor Ratnieks in the finished garden at Hampton Court. My story was one of many about bees last year and it caught the public’s imagination to such an extent that 18 months later comes the news that the number of privately owned bee colonies has increased by 50% from 80,000 to 120,000. Amateur beekeepers have harvested 3.5 million jars of honey this summer. This is worth £130 per hive, but the value to the economy in pollination is thought to be as much as £600 per hive. This follows the news (see my posting of December 1st 2009 ) that the bee population worldwide is increasing. Good news all round. Panic over.

]]> http://www.slow-life.co.uk/2010/11/04/busy-bees/feed/ 0 http://www.slow-life.co.uk/2010/07/05/joe-swift%e2%80%99s-howler/ http://www.slow-life.co.uk/2010/07/05/joe-swift%e2%80%99s-howler/#comments Mon, 05 Jul 2010 07:36:58 +0000 jonathandenby http://www.slow-life.co.uk/?p=794
I turned on the coverage of the Hampton Court Flower Show on BBC2 tonight, anxious for news of Philippa’s Girlguiding Centenary Garden (it turns out that we’ll have to wait until Friday’s show before Philippa’s garden is featured). The programme began with Rachel de Thame and Joe Swift enthusing about the highlights of the show and Joe Swift told us very excitedly that a species tree Dahlia, the Dahlia excelsa had flowered for the first time in the UK, in the Heritage Plants collection. There then appeared on the screen a picture of a mauve dahlia flower with a yellow centre. Exactly the same flower in fact as in the photo here, which was taken in my garden a few minutes later. The plant in question is six feet tall and is one of three in flower at Yewbarrow House at the moment. I bought the plant from Crug Farm Plants several years ago and it is the first of the tree dahlias to come into flower. The RHS Plantfinder lists 4 nurseries which stock Dahlia excelsa, although none of them have any stocks available now, so it is indeed a rare plant, but it is one which has happily flowered outside at Yewbarrow House ever since I first obtained

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