Live & Grow

Live & Grow 🌿 Live & Grow | Foraging, nature-led living & local honey 🍯

Sharing practical skills from nature and offering small-batch, locally produced honey. UK-based.

08/05/2026

Finally got to inspect the hives today.

Found eggs ✅
Found capped queen cells ✅
No queen ❌

Looked up and the swarm revealed itself! 🐝🌳

We did it! Now back to work and the bees 🏅🐝
04/05/2026

We did it! Now back to work and the bees 🏅🐝

Bit of a different weekend this one. Not a bee in sight, just a little run through Prague with the wife! 🏃🏽🏃🏻‍♀️Back to ...
02/05/2026

Bit of a different weekend this one. Not a bee in sight, just a little run through Prague with the wife! 🏃🏽🏃🏻‍♀️

Back to the hives soon enough 🐝

26/04/2026

Back at the apiary for the second time this weekend. Yesterday’s inspection found one hive gearing up to swarm so I set up an artificial swarm to keep them in check.

Today’s visit was all about feeding the new nucleus hive some sugar syrup to give them a head start while they find their feet.

Never a dull weekend in beekeeping.

And yes, that was a bee saying goodbye at the end.

20/04/2026

Marked the queen this weekend.

Green, because it’s the only pen I had, should’ve been white for 2026. Not my finest paint job either!

Always a bit nervous doing this and honestly sometimes I skip it, but this hive is buzzing, really busy, and if I need to split it later, having her marked makes life so much easier.

That’s the bees you can hear, and the Bluebell Railway chugging away in the background!​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Took my two assistant beekeepers along for the first hive inspection of the season.Four hives, all looking healthy. Supe...
11/04/2026

Took my two assistant beekeepers along for the first hive inspection of the season.

Four hives, all looking healthy. Supers going on. Spring is here.

There’s something about teaching your kids where food actually comes from, not from a shelf, but from thousands of tiny creatures doing incredible work. They were fascinated, fearless, and as usual full of questions.

Best Sunday morning I’ve had in a while.

30/03/2026

Checked in on the hives yesterday. I’m itching to see what’s going on with the colonies but was simply too chilly to open them.

The good news is that all the hives seem to be doing well!

Looking forward to warmer days! #

Weekend hive check 🐝Popped over to the hives this weekend just to make sure they’re ticking along.I hefted each one to g...
01/02/2026

Weekend hive check 🐝

Popped over to the hives this weekend just to make sure they’re ticking along.

I hefted each one to get a feel for their weight, then had a super quick look in a couple to see if there was still fondant left from a few weeks back. No proper inspection, just a quick in and out.

Best bit was putting my ear to the boxes, I could hear a steady “hum” so hopefully all 4 hives are still alive and well!

Now I’ll leave them alone again until we get a nice mild day.

A queen excluder sits between the brood box and the super. The workers can squeeze through but the queen can’t, so she s...
19/01/2026

A queen excluder sits between the brood box and the super. The workers can squeeze through but the queen can’t, so she stays below and the honey frames up top stay brood free.

This lot got built while I was on holiday. If there’s even a small gap or extra space and the bees are bringing nectar in fast, they’ll build comb wherever they feel like, including right on the excluder. 🍯🐝

Meet the Live and Grow team 🍯🐝Head of Sales (left) is taking enquiries and negotiating jar prices like a pro.And our you...
13/01/2026

Meet the Live and Grow team 🍯🐝

Head of Sales (left) is taking enquiries and negotiating jar prices like a pro.

And our youngest is Taste and Packaging Manager, making sure every jar passes a very strict “yummy” test… and looks the part.

I’m just the bloke in the back doing the heavy lifting and trying not to annoy the bees.

Message me if you’d like a jar put aside.

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Crawley
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