Bramble bees

There were so many bees on the newly opened brambles that the other flowers need not have bothered! Today was hot and great clump of bramble (blackberry) bushes in one side of our site has begun to flower. I had been wandering around in the sun with the camera trying to see what the bees were favoring when I was attracted by the buzzing.

It was covering in black darting dots, mainly honey bees but I also spotted, white, buff and red tailed bumblers, carder bees and some black shining mining bees.

The oil seed rape is still in flower so it was great to see the honey bees on something else. This should also help produce a better balance of honey; oil seed rape honey is very quick to set but bramble if the opposite.  We will be taking another honey harvest as soon as the oil seed rape is over so we will see how it compares.