Janet Driver

Our Almond tree looks beautiful with its early blossoms like bright stars against the dark hedge down the garden...it is still very young and rather straggly though, so another pruning job on the horison!... I'm just wondering if its a bit too cold for any bees to be around for polination... there have been fewer and fewer bees and butterflies compared with when we retired and moved to Wivenhoe...we planted a whole lot of lavender in our front garden and in the summer the bushes used to be full of bumble bees... until last year...how many of us have been unwittingly using neonicotinoid insect sprays that have been killing off the bees ? I was horrified when I got home and read the small print on a hand spray I had hurredly picked up from a pile near the checkout of a large local garden centre...I couldnt believe they would be selling this stuff at all, especially marked up at sale price just by the exit...so now I stop worrying about the insects and leave them to all the small birds flying around searching for food...and never touch that awful spray !