Catching Rays

That's the End of That

 
Q. All right.  Is there anything that I have not asked you --
(Witness fainted.)
THE ATTORNEY:  I was done.

Late Bloomer

Dahlias

Van Gogh

On the dangers of beginning a house painting project after visiting The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Gene isn't sold, but I have some backing from the younger generation.

Freedom Tower

Ground Zero

The Met

American Icons Series

George Washington Bridge.

Of Butterflies and Bees

What's On The Bookshelf

Peeping Frog

Archeologists

August Night

Charlevoix

Sleeping Bees

Baugo

She might have fallen asleep.

Cobus Creek

Then There Were Three

Hives, that is. The strong hive in the center is boiling over with bees from the original queen. 48,000+ is my estimate. The hive in the background is a split from the middle hive. The hive in the foreground replaced their queen earlier and is now gaining strength. Go bees!

Chariots of the Gods

Time moves differently

on your street and mine.

I saw an Amish man on roller blades being

propelled down the road by a lawn mower.

Chariots of the Gods…

Keep thinking.

We are hurtling through this universe

faster and faster.

Away, away.

Muscovy

With Cilantro

Bees Chaining

Blue Skies

And sunflowers that the birds planted for me. I don't argue with the birds.

Apiary Week 9, Day 57

 I finally was able to spot one of our queens!

She's on the top of the comb beneath the cluster of bees on the upper frame.

 The bees decided to fill the frame with honey.  Okay then.

 This one is a picture perfect arc of honey above capped brood.

 The bees in the middle of this frame have already hatched.

Another nice frame.

Everything was going so well I split the hives back down to two 

and added a new brood box above the stronger hive.

I put frames with queen cells in it and am hoping we get a third queen in a couple of weeks.

Ant Attack

I'm treating with cinnamon.

Weather

Junior

The green froglet from last year is hanging out.

Apiary Day 49

In the Garden

The sour cherry tree.
The robin has a nest in it and keeps fussing at me. But pie is on the horizon. And Cherry Bounce, cherries soaked in vodka for a year. It's good for your joints. Uh-huh.

Fanning the Hive

And a Word From the Offspring

Tom's working hard...

49th State Brewing Company mixes education and beer during solstice week - Fairbanks Daily News-Miner: Food

Roses with Honeysuckle

Mike

Jo called Tuesday to say that a longtime family friend, Mike (on the guitar), had been killed in a car accident early Tuesday morning.  Death does come unexpectedly.  Sometimes we get harsh reminders.  My heart is with his parents, who will bury him on Saturday.  I hope that they will be able to say good-bye and find a way to reinvent themselves, to move through this and on.

Summer Lovin'

The crazy frog in my backyard pond convinced a woman to move in, despite the three-dog situation. That guy must have it going on.

Summertime

Ongoing Apiary Tales

 Our weak hive lost her queen and just couldn't get its act together.

 Our strong hive, however, is doing a great job.

The white stuff along the top is capped honey.

The yellow-ish capped stuff in the middle is capped brood.

The cells that are uncapped and dark are pollen stores.

The cells that are uncapped with flecks of white are bee larvae.

Here's another frame from our strong hive.

We combined the two hives on Saturday to give the weak hive 

a chance to build up and survive.

New Swan Song

Jocelyn von Humboldt et al

 The house in Trinidad.

 A little brandy.

 The graduate.

 With tunes.

 Stephen.  Hmm.

 With cousin Melissa.

 Richard, Jocelyn, me, my brother Andy, niece Melissa, Gene.

Kicking back with Andy.

Apiary Day 9

Apiary Day 8

Apiary Day 5

 It's a rainy day in the apiary and the bees aren't flying around too much,

so I decided to check the monitor boards we keep beneath the screened bottom boards

to see if the bees had cast off any varroa mites.

This is from the southern hive.

My untrained eyes didn't note any mites,

but I was fascinated to see the ridge patterns of cast off

something or another.   The ridge pattern slightly above the midline

corresponds with approximately where we placed the queen.

There is another ridge pattern on the bottom edge of the board.

I can only surmise the bees are busy there, too.

We can't inspect inside the hive for a couple more weeks, 

so I guess we'll find out then.

This is the monitor board from the northern hive.

Blogger insisted on flipping it.

Anyway, the heavy ridging seen on the southern hive isn't present.

There is somewhat of an accumulation of material on the left side

and also toward the right edge.

I also didn't notice any varroa mites on this board.

Apiary Day 4

 This morning I took the entrance reducers off the hives.

The reducers help the bees keep strangers out until they

build up enough guard bees to protect the entrance,

but yesterday I noticed there was quite the line waiting to 

come into the hive.  Kind of like Whole Foods on opening day.

9:30 a.m.

If you click on this picture you'll be able to see

I've circled a couple of bees carrying pollen in on the

baskets on their legs.  Pollen is protein and it's

essential for the rearing of brood.  I've given them pollen patties

inside the hive, but natural is better.  Go bees!

Apiary Day 3

 The hives got smaller!

Last evening Gene and I removed the bottom hive bodies

that were holding the packages of bees.

The bees have now all left the packages and moved

upward to be with their queen on the frames of wax foundation.

 This is the southern hive around 10:30 a.m.

The bees are becoming active,

coming in and out of the entrance.

 The northern hive at the same time was a little busier today.

Yesterday the southern hive became active earlier.

 The ladies let me get fairly close.

 Today they're doing some orientation flights.

I hope Indiana suits them.