It all started a few weeks ago.
Wait, no. It started when I lost my bees in May, last year. So that would be 2025.
I know you understand what that loss means, so I won’t dwell on it.
But I thought long and hard about why that was. There was more than one reason, but most led back to the weather though.
And then, I didn’t give it much more thought until May this year. Why? Because my overwintered nuc from Black Mountain Honey arrived, and all of a sudden, I was weather conscious again.
And do you know what the burning question on my mind was, right then?
When actually was the June Gap?
You’ll read from many online that it takes place in June. Well, yes it does but not always. A lot of it depends on your latitude, longitude and elevation.
Ugh, science! I hear you cry. Yes, but it’s the good type! Phrenology!
No, I mean Phenology. Phrenology is feeling bumps on your skull. Phenology is the timing of natural events, such as flowering, leaf-out, brood cycles, swarming season and so on.
And, I also found that Hopkins’ Bioclimatic Law is a rule of thumb for how seasonal development shifts with geography. Hopkins proposed that spring events tend to be delayed by about 4 days for each 1° further north, 5° further west, or 400 ft / about 120 m higher elevation. Modern studies still treat it as a useful broad approximation, while also recognising that actual phenology also depends on weather, habitat, species and climate change.
That meant I could at least calculate when my June Gap in Scotland would be. And it’s later than you might think!
