News
We’re Buzzing About Our New Bee Hives!
Bee Kind to the Bees
The Month of May has been one in recognition of the great pollinators who keep this planet turning. For starters, we had hosted our World Bee Day event, in collaboration with Scott Hamilton, owner of the Hamilton Honey Bee Co.
Scott was kind enough to come down on the day, and share some knowledge of the native Irish Honey Bees, their positive impact on the local environment, their life cycle, and recent challenges to their survival. Visitors on the day could browse bee-themed gifts and goodies, and venture into our exclusive Walled Garden, Wildflower Meadow, and Heritage Apple Orchard. Kids could take part in bee-themed activities, before taking a trip down to our outdoor adventure playpark.
See highlights from World Bee Day via our Instagram HERE
Current Challenges
Warmer temperatures this year have lead to an earlier onset of Spring, particularly noticeable throughout our Gardens, and this has prompted bees to emerge sooner than usual.
This has brought both benefits and challenges to the local population of bees. For one, this early emergence allows bees to take advantage of early-blooming flowers like daffodils and crocuses, which provide essential nectar and pollen sources, and guaranteeing the bees flowers to pollinate which beforehand may not have been certain.
On the contrary, this has broadened the phenomenon known as “The June Gap”, in which there is a shortage of forage available for honey bees. This occurs after the abundance of spring blossoms and before the summer flowers bloom, potentially leading to food scarcity for bees.
Montalto’s Response
In response to these challenges, Montalto aims to participate in initiatives such as the All-Ireland Pollinator Plan. In collaboration with The Hamilton Honey Bee Co., Scott has now officially installed our new beehives on the estate, marking the start of an incredible journey. Over the coming months, the brood will grow, the hives will thrive, and by next year, we’ll be tasting our very own Montalto Honey!
With the introduction of hives into the Estate at the end of May, Scott Hamilton, owner of the Hamilton Honey Bee Co commented:
“We began planning for the introduction of bee hives last year and it has been our pleasure to have been collaborating with the fantastic team at Montalto to get to this initial phase of installation.
The joint approach from all stakeholders fuses together both the visitor engagement potential, together with the ecological focus and protection of our Native Irish Black Honey Bee.
The Hamilton Honey Bee Co, has taken the deliberate decision to only support colonies of our Native species (Apis Mellifera Mellifera) as these bees are naturally suited to our local climate and topography. It is an entomological asset of our country that is worth protecting and so we will only support colonies of our native bees and will not import any other variety of bees onto these shores. We have a wonderfully unique topography within the Drumlins of County Down and to partner with Montalto provides a wonderful foraging opportunity for the colonies situated on the Estate.
In line with this central theme, World Bee Day recently gave us a hugely rewarding opportunity to communicate with visitors to the estate. We thoroughly enjoyed sharing the work that we have embarked on, protecting our pollinators, and to share information on our honey bees and the importance of how they impact the environment around us.
We are looking forward to developing the colonies further into the summer, and ensuring we provide a strong partnership with the team at Montalto Estate for both their visitors and members.”
See more images of our new hives via our Instagram HERE
Make sure to not miss out on any future events you may ‘bee’ interested in, we regularly update our what’s on page HERE