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Children of the Sun

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Facing the Giant bees

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Facing the giant bees | SLICE I Full documentary

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The Mini Adventures of Winnie the Pooh | Lullabee | Disney Junior UK

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Owl City - To The Sky (Official Music Video)

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Tawny Owl Chicks Fly Free, With a Helping Hand From Me - Wildlife Artist Robert E Fuller

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﻿﻿﻿﻿﻿ Tawny owlets Bramble & Sage are lucky to be alive after their owl dad stopped bringing them food when they were just tiny chicks. Helping hand I'm not clear why the tawny owl dad, Ozzy, stopped providing for his family, but after seeing the tiny tawny owlets tug hungrily at their owl mum's [...]

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The Queen Bee, and Other Nature Stories

E-text prepared by D Alexander, Matthew Wheaton, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive (http://archive.org)

THE QUEEN BEE AND OTHER NATURE STORIES

PREFACE.

CONTENTS.

LIST OF COLOURED PLATES.

The Dragon-Fly and the Water-lily

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Author: Carl Ewald; Category: Literature & Fiction, Politics & Social Sciences; Price: Free

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PLEASE NOTE:

This offer is limited to one pack of seeds per customer.

The seeds are on us - totally free! We just ask for 99p to cover the postage costs.... oh and if you're buying honey, you get free seeds with your order anyway!

If you'd like more than one pack, we offer boxes of seeds on our shop.

How to plant these free wildflower seeds

The best planting time for these bee-saving seeds is between end of February and end of July.

Our bee-friendly seeds

Our seeds are a special bee-friendly mix. They have over 30 different types of wildflower. Each has been carefully selected to attract bees. But every bee's tastebuds are different. We notice that regular visitors to our wildflowers have their individual favourite flowers or colours!

Just sprinkle the seeds thinly on soil or compost. You can sow the seeds in your garden, borders, pots, a park, or window box. You could even plant them in an empty honey pot!! Just keep watering so the soil is damp and the first green shoots should appear. The seeds will flower from June until end of September.

Help Save the Bees!

Bees are dying! Partly caused by fewer flowers and meadows. We rely on bees to pollinate a third of all the food we eat, so we're determined to save them!

For the past four years we've been planting a bee-saving flower for every bottle of Just Bee Drinks we sell - so far we've planted over five million flowers!

It's no different for Just Bee Honey - for every jar sold we'll plant a bee-saving flower :-)

Join our mission and help save the bees... we'll send you a free packet of bee saving flower seeds to plant in your garden or local park.

For more information about our free wildflower seeds, watch our video above!

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A a FREE packet of bee-saving wildflower seeds. This offer is limited to one pack of seeds per customer. The seeds are on us - totally free! We just ask for 75p to cover the postage costs. And if you're buying honey, you get free seeds with your order anyway!

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The Mini Adventures of Winnie the Pooh: Owl's House

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How the moon affects the human body | Season 5 | Episode 38 | The House of Wellness

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Bee Movie (2007) - Pollen Power Scene (1/10) | Movieclips

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Coldplay - A Sky Full Of Stars (Official Video)

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10 Things You Didn't Know You Needed To Know About Croydon
Croydon is London Borough of Culture in 2023 - and there's more to it than just multi storey car parks and Peep Show. Here are 10 things you didn't know you needed to know about the south London borough.
1. The Victoria line was supposed to run to Croydon

This will still be difficult for Croydonites to stomach well over 50 years on, but original plans for the Victoria line, which opened in 1968, would've seen the Underground line stretch down to Croydon. As Jago Hazzard explains in this video, during the 1940s and 50s, there were serious plans for the tube line to run a station named either Croydon Central or Town Hall - alas, all-too-familiar budgetary issues put the kibosh on this.

2. But Croydon did have a station called "Jolly-sailor"

That's right, before Norwood Junction was Norwood Junction, it was named Jolly-sailor - after the local boozer. And the Jolly-sailor played a particularly interesting role in rail history; it was part of Croydon's atmospheric railway - a pioneering, if ultimately flawed, piece of kit that propelled trains from one pumping station to the next, via a vacuum in a pipe laid in between the rails, attached to a piston on the bottom of the train. (Jolly-sailor was home to one such pumping station). The railway was opened in 1845, but shut down by 1847 - in part due to the fact rats kept gnawing through the equipment.

3. Lots of mediocre things were invented by Croydonites

If you think the pneumatic railway sounds like a damp squib, wait until you hear about some of Croydon's other great inventions. Among the gizmos coined by Croydonites are: the 'baby billiard table'; the' water bike'; a basket for milk bottles that can be attached to your letterbox; and the 'man-lifting kite'. Now we can hardly imagine life without them...

4. Charlie Chaplin was once kidnapped at Croydon Airport

The former Croydon Airport/Aerodrome is a cornucopia of did-you-knows. For instance, did you know that the "mayday" distress call was created here? One of the most perplexing stories from the golden age of air travel is when a desperate Clapham cinema owner moonlighted as the film star Charlie Chaplin's chauffeur, picking him up from his inbound flight from Paris, and whisking him straight off to his cinema, for an impromptu performance. More on that strange tale here.

5. There are White Cliffs of Croydon

Perhaps Vera Lynn never sang about Croydon's White Cliffs because they weren't famous enough - or maybe it's because it's hard to find a rhyme for Riddlesdown. Whatever the case, this surprisingly verdant swath of the borough does indeed feature a disused chalk quarry, which sparkles quite magnificently in the sun.

6. Croydon had the first self-service Sainsbury's

When it first arrived on the scene, self service at Sainsbury's had nothing to do with unexpected items in the bagging area. Back then, it meant you no longer went to the counter to ask a chap in an apron for individual items - instead you were given a basket and *gasp* filled it yourself. The Sainsbury's on London Road, West Croydon was the first to pioneer this newfangled American style of grocery shopping, and although the building went on to become other things, today it's once again a Sainsbury's. Bonus fact: The Store in South Croydon - a very good restaurant/cocktail bar - also used to be a Sainsbury's, and has many of the decorative tiles still in situ.

7. Croydon also had some of the world's most decadent department stores

Before the days of the tenaciously moribund Whitgift Centre, shoppers had the choice of not one but three great department stores in the heart of Croydon. Grants was so posh, the Queen and her husband once popped in for tea here in 1960. By the mid 1970s, Alders had become the the third-largest department store in the UK, only behind Selfridges and Harrods. As for Kennards, this retail mecca boasted its own miniature railway, golf course, a restaurant fitted out with a huge pipe organ... and at one time even its own zoo. Today, all three stores have bitten the dust.

8. The Crystal Palace mascot is nicked from Portugal

There is one football shirt you'll see worn in Croydon more than any other - and that's the one belonging to Croydon FC Crystal Palace FC. Take a closer look at the club crest, and you'll spot an illustration of the long-burned-down Crystal Palace (makes sense, because the club originally played here before moving to Selhurst Park). But the most blatant thing on the badge is a bald eagle. So what piece of local folklore does this winged beast derive from? Er, from 1973, when then-manager Malcolm Allison decided to nick Benfica's avian mascot, in a bid to make his club look cooler.

9. Sherlock Holmes did a lot of sleuthing in Croydon

At least 20 Sherlock Holmes stories were penned in Croydon - at 12 Tennison Road in South Norwood to be precise - where Arthur Conan Doyle upped sticks to after deciding there might be a living to be made in this mystery writing lark. The area clearly rubbed off on him, because Croydon features quite a bit in the Victorian mysteries, including The Adventure of the Norwood Builder, and The Cardboard Box which begins with the delivery of an innocent-enough-looking package to a respectable Croydon lady.

Agatha Christie featured Croydon in her novel Death in the Clouds, which involves the mysterious death of a French moneylender, as her plane comes in to land at Croydon Airport. There's also a book by Freeman Wills Crofts called The 12.30 from Croydon, in which there's another peculiar fatality on a flight - this one setting off from Croydon Airport. Just as well they shut the place down, what with all those sky-high murders...

Speaking of detective writers, while the name Raymond Chandler conjures up images of bourbon-swilling private dicks traipsing around Los Angeles, the noir writer lived as a youngster on Auckland Road in Upper Norwood, where you'll now find a blue plaque commemorating this fact.

10. You can walk from Croydon to Lambeth to Southwark to Bromley back to Croydon in about two minutes

We indulged in a little borough-hopping a few years back (see video below) at London's own version of the Four Corners in the US. Look out too for the site of the old Vicar's Oak, which historically marked the meeting point of the parishes of Lambeth, Croydon, Camberwell and a detached part of Battersea.

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10 Things You Didn't Know You Needed To Know About Croydon

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Tasty trivia on the south London borough.

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The first pedestrian lights, early CCTV and even a protest for films on Sundays

(Image: (Photo by Ted West/Central Press/Hulton Archive/Getty Images).)

The word "Croydon" comes from the Anglo-Saxon words for "crocus valley". In the 1700s, it was a village with fewer than 50 inhabitants, but by the 20th century it was already an important area of industry, known for car manufacture.

While pictures of Croydon over the last 100 years or so are almost unrecognisable, there are glimmers of the place appearing early with the building of walls, the protests for weekend films, even the installation of CCTV. These pictures show moments in the lives of ordinary inhabitants of Croydon over the last century.

The installation of the first pedestrian lights, the divers and sunbathers, the newspaper floggers. The people who made the place. We've compiled a selection of our favourite pictures of Croydon over the years. But in some cases, in some of the pictures, the town is almost unrecognisable - showing just how much it's changed in the last century.

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Incredible pictures of Croydon's changes over the last 100 years

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The first pedestrian lights, early CCTV and even a protest for films on Sundays

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Famous People From Croydon, England & Celebs Born In Croydon

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Croydon has produced a number of famous personalities, including actors, models, rappers, directors, artists etc.

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Cabaret - Willkommen, Bienvenue, Welcome

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ETAZYJ8AFO

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NASA's interactive map for observing the Moon each day of the year.

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Your monthly journey through the fascinating world of space and astronomy.

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Star profile page for Emmas star. This star shines for you!.

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The Tradition of “Telling the Bees” - Bee Good

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For centuries, beekeepers across Europe have kept up this incredibly ancient tradition of honeybees being messengers by “telling the bees”.

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Take That - Rule The World (Official Video)

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Owls have been part of human culture and mythology for millennia, viewed as everything from wise good-luck charms to demonic harbingers of death. That fascination may come from their odd anatomy, which makes them stand out among other bird species. Owls can swivel their heads around, are nocturnal, fly nearly silently, and can stay hidden thanks to exceptional camouflage-not to mention their expressive faces.

Found on every continent except Antarctica, owls are wonderfully unique birds. Here are some of the things that make these creatures so special. Get ready for some fascinating facts.

1. Owls' Eyes Are Actually Tubes

Owls don't have eyeballs-they're more like eye tubes. They're elongated and held in place by a bony structure in the skull called sclerotic rings. Because of this, owls can't move or roll their eyes within their sockets. (That's where the heightened neck mobility comes in.)

Owls have binocular vision similar to humans, meaning they can see an object with both eyes at the same time. This gives owls a great ability to judge height, weight, and distance.

They also have extraordinary night vision and far-sightedness, but there's a drawback. Because they are far-sighted, owls can't see objects up close. To make up for this, they have filoplumes-small hair-like feathers on their beaks and feet-to feel out their food when hunting.

Finally, owls have three eyelids. One is for blinking, one is for sleeping, and one is for keeping their eye "tubes" clean.

2. They Are Made to Have Flexible Necks

It's a misconception that owls can turn their necks 360 degrees. The accurate measure is 135 degrees in either direction from facing forward, which is 270 total degrees of movement. Not 360, but certainly nothing to scoff at.

This ability is important for the owl because of the immobility of its eyes, and the creature has a number of anatomical adaptations that make it possible. First, owls have 14 vertebrae in their necks, double the number for the average bird. They also have alternative blood vessels routing blood to the head and blood pooling systems to keep blood circulating to and from the brain when neck movements cut off circulation. Finally, owls have air-cushioned vessel casings so they don't rupture any blood vessels when snapping their necks around so dramatically and quickly.

3. Their Ears Are Wonky but Effective

Owls may have amazing eyes, but it's their ears that do the real work when hunting. And it's their apparent imperfections that make them so effective.

Many species of owl have ears that are not only placed asymmetrically on their heads but are also different sizes. This allows the owl to receive sounds at slightly different times, providing the birds with an exceptional ability to pinpoint the location of a sound; when a sound is equally loud in both ears, the owl knows it has zeroed in on the source and distance.

Meanwhile, their flattened faces funnel sound to the ears, magnifying it so that they can detect even the slightest sound from tiny prey.

4. Their Feathers Help Them Fly Silently

Owls are known as silent fliers-they must be completely quiet if they want to swoop in on fast-moving, far-off prey. To accomplish this, they have broad wings that allow them to glide, minimizing the flapping that creates most of the noise from a flying bird.

For when flapping is necessary, many owl species have special flight feathers that make the action as silent as possible. The leading edges of the primary flight feathers are stiff fringes, reminiscent of the teeth of a comb, that reduce turbulence. On the trailing edges of the same feathers are soft fringes, similar to the frayed ends of a torn piece of cloth, which further reduce any remaining turbulence.

Below these feathers, the wings of owls are also covered in fine downy feathers that dampen sound even more.

5. They Can Swivel Their Toes

Owls are zygodactyl, which refers to the structure of their feet: two toes (toes two and three) facing forward and two (toes one and four) facing backward. This is what is seen in woodpeckers and parrots, and it is optimal for gripping on prey and branches. Owls are not stuck in this setup, however. They can rotate their fourth toe back and forth, which is why when owls are flying, they have three toes in front and one in back.

For a truly exceptional grip, owls have the ability to lock their toes around an object so that they don't need to continually contract their muscles. They get maximum grip with minimal effort.

6. Not All Owls Hoot

When you think of an owl's voice, you think of a gentle, quivering hoo-hoo. However, not all owls sound the same-not even close. The characteristic hoot belongs to the great horned owl, but there's more to hear.

The barn owl, for instance, emits a harsh screeching sound reminiscent of a squeaking door. Meanwhile, the barred owl sounds almost more like the neigh of a horse than any vocalization you'd expect from a bird. Watch the video below to hear just a few of the distinct and varied sounds that exist across owl species.

7. Some Stick Close to the Ground

Not all owls fly high through the skies and nest in hollows up in tall trees. As one of the smallest owl species in North America, the aptly named burrowing owl is opportunistic and stays close to the ground. They nest in underground burrows, often taking over ones left by prairie dogs, squirrels, and armadillos. They'll dig their own homes if necessary, though.

Often, burrowing owls will line the entrance of their burrows with animal dung. This is a wise hunting strategy, as dung works as bait for insects that the owl can then feed on.

8. They Are Symbolic

Owls carry rich symbolism across a number of cultures, and the meaning of these creatures varies greatly. Most popular is the owl's representation of wisdom, which can be seen throughout Western folklore and even pop culture such as Winnie the Pooh. This is likely because of its intelligent, strategic approach to hunting.

Native Americans believe in the owl's connection to wisdom but also connect it to death. Hearing its hoot can be considered unlucky. In Greek mythology, the snow owl is the sacred animal of Athena, goddess of war. Any sighting of the bird on the battlefield was considered to be her presence.

9. A Group of Owls Is Called a Parliament

One curious fact is that when a group of owls gets together, it's called a parliament or a congress or, less commonly, a stare. While the official origin of the term is unknown, it may have something to do with owls being considered wise and knowledgeable, as one might expect a gathering of government officials to be. One source suggests that C.S. Lewis' "Chronicles of Narnia" may have been a book that sealed owls' reputation as a parliament, as that term was used to describe a fictitious owl meeting.

10. Owls Like to 'Borrow' Nests

Owls are not great at building their own nests, preferring to take over those built by other birds-ones that have been abandoned by crows, hawks, or even squirrels. Some opt to nest in cavities or in the crotch of trees, where they can find shelter, or, as in the case of elf owls, in saguaro cacti where woodpeckers have already made holes. Some treeless owls nest right on the ground or take advantage of burrows, as described above.

11. Owls Engage in Slow Courtship

Owls must overcome a natural fear of each other in order to mate. According to the San Diego Zoo, males bring offerings to a female (who's usually much larger) to convince her of his intentions. He may also perform a "sky dance" that involves tricks while flying. It could take a few hours for her to lose natural fear of him and to move close enough in order to mate. Mating owls then spend lots of time together, preening their feathers.

12. Number of Babies Depends on Food Supply

The number of eggs an owl lays in a given season depends on her access to food. If supplies are low, an owl may not lay a single egg. In other years, a mother owl could lay anywhere from one to 14 eggs. Different species lay different numbers of eggs. During the incubation period, the mother loses feathers on her belly so that she can put her warm skin directly against the surface of the eggs to keep them even warmer. The baby owls, or owlets, hatch within three to five weeks of the eggs being laid, and will hatch in the order in which they were laid. This is known as "asynchronous hatching."

13. Owls Range in Size

Owls range in size from teeny-tiny to large and imposing. The smallest owl is the elf owl, which is only six inches tall and weighs 1.5 ounces. It looks like a sparrow and lives in the southwestern United States and Mexico. The largest owl is Blakiston's fish owl, weighing 6 to 8.8 pounds with a wingspan of 6.5 feet. It can be found in Russia, China, and Hokkaido, Japan, and it eats fish, as its name suggests.

14. Owls Do Not Chew Their Food

Owls have no teeth in their beaks to chew prey. Instead, they swallow it whole or in large chunks. Once in the stomach, anything that's not digestible-like bones, fur, and insect exoskeletons-is formed into oval-shaped pellets. These are regurgitated while the owl roosts during the day and tend to accumulate beneath an owl's nest. When studied by biologists, these pellets provide plenty of information about an owl's diet.

15. Some Species Are Declining

There are approximately 250 species of owls across the world, and unfortunately, not all of them are thriving. The IUCN Red List labels dozens of owl species at varying degrees of concern, from near threatened to critically endangered. Some notable at-risk species include the snowy owl, spotted owl, and a few pygmy owls. Continue reading for ideas to help conservation and protection efforts.

Save At-Risk Owl Species

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Owls are known for their big eyes, but what would you say if we told you those aren't really eyeballs? Here are more interesting owl facts.

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14 facts you need to know about bees | Friends of the Earth

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Why do we need bees?

Bees are essential to a healthy environment and healthy economy. We rely on them and other insects to pollinate most of our fruit and vegetables. But bees are under threat and without them so is our food and economy. You can make your garden, street and community bee-friendly. It's also vital that we persuade the government to take action. Join the generation that saves bees.

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14 facts you need to know about bees | Friends of the Earth

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Bees are essential to a healthy environment and healthy economy. We rely on them and other insects to pollinate most of our fruit and vegetables. But bees are under threat and without them so is our food and economy. You can make your garden, street and community bee-friendly.

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🐝 13-Minute Healing Honey Bee Hive Sounds 🍯

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🐝 13-Minute Healing Honey Bee Hive Sounds 🍯

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UK Astronomy... Because there are a billion worlds in your back garden

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UK Astronomy is a registered charity whose ethos is to educate, inspire and excite others by sharing our knowledge and passion for space. We do this by offering astronomy outreach and public engagement for anyone who thinks space is awesome and wants to find out how vast and magnificent it all is.