Archive for May, 2017

Received my delivery of Bumble Bees from @Dragonfli and a Bonus Swarm of Honey Bees arrived the very same day!

Friday, May 26th, 2017

on Wednesday 24th May , I received my delivery of Bumble Bees from Dragonfli, my neighbours reported a swarm of honey bees landed in their back garden, and then later flew over the wall, and settled on my blue recycle bin!

So whilst I hived my bumble bees, and waited 30 minutes to release them, I quickly got my Beek gear together to quickly put the swarm in a swarm box!

Delivery box of bumble bees

Delivery box of bumble bees

box of bumble bees opened

box of bumble bees opened

box of bumble bees opened paperwork removed

box of bumble bees opened paperwork removed

bumble bees hived

bumble bees hived

The honey bee swarm was captured by me, and hived – they are currently doing well, but I’ve left them to do their thing, before I inspect.

swarm of honey bees on recycle bin

swarm of honey bees on recycle bin

Traditionally according to the rhyme a load of hay, but it looks like a prime swarm, by the number of bees, which could have a laying queen, and also later by the weight in the box, I’ll let you know, how they turn out?

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A swarm in May is worth a load of hay, A swarm in June is worth a ….

Tuesday, May 23rd, 2017

Last week of May and first week of June – “Swarming Season”

The beekeeping rhyme goes…

A swarm in May is worth a load of hay,

A swarm in June is worth a silver spoon,

A swarm in July ain’t worth a fly.

This weekend is reported to be the hottest weekend of the year, and if memory serves me correct, it’s at this time of year when the swarms arrive.

So I’ve put out five bait hives, these are just used bee hives, with old comb, which to bees stinks of bees and is heaven, in hope to catch a swarm of bees.

Some interest being shown already, shot on an iPhone 7 in slow motion!

fingers crossed.

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Bumblebee delivery next week

Wednesday, May 17th, 2017

I’ve just received an email from DragonFli, my Bumblebees will be delivered next week, I hope the rain stops…

bumblebee-delivery

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Superfast Broadband FIBRE is 400m away from our house! It’s now in the “Shire!”

Monday, May 15th, 2017

Superfast Broadband FIBRE is 400m away from our house!

2017-05-15-085631

I spotted the van even closer to the house this morning, approx 400m away now! The next junction box after this, is 20m from our house at the base of our telegraph pole!

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Andysworld! to get Superfast Broadband ? Possibly ?

Thursday, May 11th, 2017

If you don’t know, I live in a rural idle in Yorkshire which some have described as a “Shire out of Tolkien” where the hobbits live! (I’m actually a little larger than a hobbit, some would say much larger!)

Lovely as it is, it does suffer one draw back, currently I’m in the 10% of the population without what the Government calls “Superfast Broadband” – at best when the wind blows in the right direction I may get up to 3.5 Meg download speed, my telephone line is still connected to a telegraph pole, and my line length is approx 3.9km from the BT exchange, and that’s not as the crow flies, because the came runs in a junction at the side of the road.

So broadband speed is slow. Three years ago, I blogged when I “nerded or geeked out” – Welcome to Cabinet World! – Andy stalks more cabs! , checking out the local cabs in the area, that had been upgraded, and fibre enabled, and hoped one day that poor old Cabinet Number 10 would be upgraded. All the other cabs in the local town have been upgraded but this sad cabinet has been left, and this is where my telephone line terminates!

3 years later, it remains the same!

BUT…

Whilst out walking in early March 2017, the noisy bugger I am, spotted a notice on a BT Telegraph pole, near my house

Openreach Notice on Telegraph pole

Openreach Notice on Telegraph pole

When I first noticed it, I didn’t read it fully, and thought maybe they were replacing the old telegraph poles because they had rotten, but then I visited When Can I get Fibre ? which I have visited many times, last year!

When Can I get Fibre ?

When Can I get Fibre ?

I could not believe it now states FTTP – Fibre to the Premises, so excited, and I’m sure a little bit of wee came out, I rushed back to the notice on the telegraph pole, and read in more detail…

“to install fibre broadband pole/s” – I’ve read articles, by Openreach, which have suggested they are now using poles and not holes!

Early April, I spotted Openreach Engineers near my Cab 10, but it had not changed, and more recently I’ve been seeing them getting closer to my house.

img_1338I asked this engineer, how far they were going and he said he didn’t know! This was 24 April 2017. Approx 1800 metres from my house.

Today, they are just round the corner! (750 metres away!)  You can see the reel of fibre on the rear of the lorry.

2017-05-11-085133

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Goodbye Robert Miles and Thanks for the Anthem!

Thursday, May 11th, 2017

Yesterday DJ Robert Miles aged 47, lost his battle with cancer, and if you under the age of 25 you probably have not got a scobby who I’m talking about.

So click play on the following You Tube music/video track

and I’m sure you will recognize it!

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Andy’s gets adventurous with Arduino Prototyping and Embedded Systems and adds a LCD display

Wednesday, May 10th, 2017

So it was naff, hooked up to a computer, so I could read Temperature and Humidity, so my friends at EmbeddedSilicon sent me a LCD readout, I think it’s called a 16×9 something! So now it’s a bit more useful, as a standalone display.

LCD display showing Andysworld!

LCD display showing Andysworld!

LCD display showing Temperature and Humidity

LCD display showing Temperature and Humidity

LCD display showing Temperature and Humidity

LCD display showing Temperature and Humidity

My thanks to the peeps at EmbeddedSilicon for the items. I’m now waiting for a WiFi board!

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Andy’s first steps into Arduino Prototyping and Embedded Systems

Tuesday, May 9th, 2017

So the problem, I need to measure temperature and humidity, and calculate the condensation risk in my attic!

The Solution

An Arduino and a temperature and humidity module, and I can do the rest, and beam it to the Cloud for plotting!

and I just know the place to go to get this stuff – EmbeddedSilicon.com

and here it is:-

Arduino Uno and DHT11 sensor

Arduino Uno and DHT11 sensor

and this is the output from the serial console

Console output - sensors readings

Console output - sensors readings

Andy get’s adventurous and adds a breakout shield (I think that’s what they call it!)

Arduino with a breakout shield

Arduino with a breakout shield

Got to find a WiFi module, then I can beam results to the cloud…

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Andy get’s arty! – Steinunn Thórarinsdóttir #sculptureculture #Hull2017 @gormley_art @2017Hull

Thursday, May 4th, 2017

and that’s Arty!

To get my steps up this lunchtime, I went for a walk around the University of Hull campus listening to music on my iPhone using my AirPods and followed the sculpture trail, as part of the Hull City of Culture gig, An exhibition of life-sized sculptures of human figures by Icelandic artist Steinunn Thórarinsdóttir is placed around the campus. The sculptures are here until 8th October 2017, so plenty of time to see them yet.

More info of the sculpture trail is available here, here’s a photo of the sculptures around the campus.

An exhibition of life-sized sculptures of human figures by Icelandic artist Steinunn Thórarinsdóttir

An exhibition of life-sized sculptures of human figures by Icelandic artist Steinunn Thórarinsdóttir

It does remind me of a lot of the sculptors by  Antony Gormley, you know that bloke that did the Angel of the North and other stuff!

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Andy’s Bumblebee Hive – Beepol Villa

Monday, May 1st, 2017
Bumble Bee Hive - Beepol Villa

Bumble Bee Hive - Beepol Villa

This is my Bumblebee Hive – Beepol Villa, Lindsey purchased this for my birthday last year. It’s low maintenance and requires less management (or no management) compared to Honey Bees, it does not provide any honey, but the Bumble bees are excellent pollinators.

The hive is currently empty, and I’m waiting for the delivery of the bumble bees in May! The bumble bees are – Bombus terrestris audax, or the Buff-Tailed Bumblebee.

This could be my closet to keeping bees this year until my health improves. At present I find it difficult carrying bee hives around, so my strength needs to improve. (that’s unless a swarm of honey bees arrive, and then they need managing!)

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