The bees are buzzing! Saturday afternoon the ladies had this cloud around the hive most of the afternoon. I find myself hoping the neighbors don't look around their side of the fence when this happens. They were in a good mood. The only time I noticed a bit of defensiveness was when I got next to the hive to fill their water bowl. As carefully and slowly as I was moving, one of the bees left the bowl and flew straight at my head, buzzing me loudly. I stepped back to give her time. The guard bees were on duty as well. I'm pleased to see it - all good signs that all is well in the hive. As much as I want to open the hive and paw through it to see what's going on, it's best to let the bees do what they are born to do.
Watched a DVD that a co-worker recommended to me this evening: Tales from the Hive. It had some awesome footage, and it was amazing to see close up what happens in a hive. Plus, they were the first thing I've read / seen that talked about the bee bridge, something we saw the first time we opened up our hive.
The garden continues to do well. This weekend we began to eat our Sugar Snap Peas and Arugula. We took some beets to my sister as well, and explained how the leaves are excellent eats as well. The cucumbers and tomatoes are all growing well. We did lose some cucumbers from some unknown pest, but there are still about five or six plants doing well. The zucchini are growing quickly, the carrots are developing large leafy tops, and the leeks are thickening.
I did cut back the large Lemon Balm, it's seeding and taking over the garden. We've got several transplants that are doing great, so the plant will continue to live in the garden. Picked up Common Fennel, Dill, and an extra Echinachea at OSH this weekend. One of the old Echinacheas has a flower head on it!
The strawberries are doing great, and the first berries are ready to be eaten. The blackberry has small unripe berries on it. The plum tree has hundreds of green plums on it, and our little apple tree has the teeniest baby apples on it.
Overall, all is well in the garden. <3.
where did you find the dvd? I'm interested in learning about the bee bridges too, as obviously, my bees did it too (not so much anymore though)
ReplyDeleteMy local library has copies, that's where I found it. http://plsinfo.org/
ReplyDeleteAmazon has it as well (of course!) http://www.amazon.com/NOVA-Bees-Tales-Hive-Nova/dp/B000MZGN4K/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1242165911&sr=8-1
It's about an hour long, not sure I'd spend $18 on it.
The bee bridges are for the bees to establish bee space! That blew me away. I wondered if it was for transport (bees walking across bees) or communication of some kind. The dvd showed the bee bridges during the bees establishing a hive in a hollow log.