Cladonia.

I popped back to my little private copse again to Blip this cladonia, I’m sure I tried it a couple of years ago but wasn’t happy with the result. It infests the top of a fence post, just the one, which is one in a row of a dozen or more, all the others have either moss or are bald. This particular colony has been there for quite a few years, but then we don’t have many reindeer to nibble it. While I was thus engaged, a dog came up to say “Hello,” it’s human was concerned that the dog was getting in the picture until I showed him what was on the screen. The height of the fruiting body is about a centimetre and there is nothing that isn't on the post in view.
 
After that, it was down to the apiary; I wanted to get reference weights for the hives so that I could keep an eye on how much they are eating; it’s not something I’ve ever done before, but I now have an electronic luggage scale so it’s easy to do. The swarm and the colony that I had re-queened came in at 50 pounds, the boring one was 45 while the mother of the swarm was only 40. I’ll be keeping an eye on that last one although I don't expect any problems for, in spite of it having the highest mite count, it still wasn’t high, and I don’t normally lose colonies over winter. It is the perceived wisdom that a hive needs 20 pounds of stores to to see it through the next four or five months, however many bees there are; it seems that the larger colonies are more energy efficient and so need less food per bee.

Thanks to Ninniex for hosting the TinyTuesday challenge.