All a Buzz

Only one honeybee agreed to sit for this photo.  You'll find her to the left and
down a bit from center.

It was time to meditate.  The usual time is much earlier in the day, more formal and less active.  But the bees were calling me and I caved.

There is nothing more sublime, more meditative, than sitting on the ground and inspecting the Salvia (Blue Hill) along with the honeybees.  The actual things I get to do today are snip off the spent strands of blooms to encourage the plant to make more.  Toward the end of summer, there are fewer flowers available for the girls in their foraging for nectar and pollen. The sacredness of this little task surrounded me, opened my heart to overflowing and blessed me with honeybee love.  I was all a buzz.

Hyssop Honey

The Children of Israel used it for a paint brush.  I'm beginning to see why.  A month or so ago Things I get to do today included learning  more about Camphor Hyssop.  All I knew before I read about it in the seed catalog is summed up in this post's first sentence--used as a paint brush.

Some of these purple brushes are nearly 6" long

The bees it was supposed to attract had not yet found it or its nectar was not yet available.  But now, now the flowers are long and fuzzy, and the whole nearly-seven-feet-tall grouping of perennial hyssops are humming with the prospect of honey.  First thing in the morning until last warmth of the evening you'll find golden, furry honey bees from my neighbor's hive collected around the purple columns, pushing their eager tongues deep into the micro throats of this delicate flower from the mint family that grows outside and up against my living room window--a perfect viewing area. I wonder if there is even a teaspoon of honey altogether here for their efforts.  It matters not to the bees.  The 30 or so girls working the blooms this morning are finding what they are looking for.

Buzzing Berries

They're good fresh. They're even better in cobbler.  I've made a deal with my neighbor's honeybee colony:  they make the marionberries, and I'll make the dessert.

Honeybee berry builder

My little heart skipped and danced thinking about Things I get to do today that will soon include picking marionberries.  These glorious, winged, buzzing sweethearts reminded me that the process was well underway.  Big bumble bees of some sort were assisting. Interesting to see how they shared duties:  the bumbles worked only the barely-open blossoms, while the honeys liked the extended-petal versions.  They've got it covered.

Sweet assistance

I'll make sure I have my vanilla ice cream recipe chilled for along side the steaming, golden, berry-bubbling dessert.  We're inviting guests.  Sign up now.

Home, Sweet Home

The honeybees died.  All of them.  We don't know what the problem was, perhaps the cold we had in November.  It was about that time that activity in the hive stopped.  Postmortem for the bees and cleaning my/sister's hive is on the list of Things I get to do today.  To be quite truthful, I've been putting it off.

But the sun was eager to get up this morning--no sense of dread on her part--to shine over the whole planet with its calm and wild, its love and fear, its life and death.  So I'm on with this task.

We opened the hive, carefully removing the rain roof, the lid, and prying the top bars loose, one or two or three at a time.  Each bar held an exquisite comb, completely empty save an inch or so wide strip of wax-capped honey at the top next to the bar.  We saved all the comb on the bars to show and discuss with our honeybee mentor, looking for clues, wanting to make it better next time.

Clean hive, airing in the sun, top bar with honey added

A small handful of dead bees in a corner were scooped out and buried.  All signs of mold were washed out, and then the hive was left open to air and dry under the blessing of a radiantly blue sky and an embracing sun.

Within half an hour two or three honeybees found the open hive and came to lick off honey that we could not see.  They went home and told their colony friends.  News travels through antennae and waggle dances in the bee world, and this was the sweetest of messages.

You can see shiny honey in the dark cells.  At the top, the white area is
wax-capped, finished honey.

We brought out a bar with generous honey along the top as well as open cells of partially completed honey three or four inches down the comb. Now there was real action.

The girls are now opening the wax-capped honey.  You can see shards of wax on the floor of the hive as well
as bits of white wax in the dark cells.  All the "wet" honey in the lower cells has already been licked out.
 Very Busy Bees.

And that's the good news, the best of news:  though a colony of bees did not survive to carry on the hive, their labor is now providing magnificent food for bees from other colonies in the neighborhood at a time when there is very little to be found.  When these gals get ready to swarm, they will certainly know where a good home, sweet home is waiting.  We'll keep you posted.

Honey in the Morning

Got a new ring tone for my front door bell.   ". . .Honey in evening.  Honey at supper time."  OK, so I stretched the facts a smidgen.  My door bell still "ding, dongs" like most.  What is unique is the fragrant greeting when you come inside.

"Be my little honey and love me all the time."

On a ledge by my front door rests the honeycomb that broke loose in my sister's hive last fall.  We didn't reattach it, and the bees have gone their way with the cold.  This piece of their comb remains.  I've placed it where it can greet all of us as we come and go.  The smell from this honeycomb is complex:  a great variety of sweet and delicate florals all mixed together.  As I breath it in, my loveliest of Things I get to do today is to see in my mind's mural the myriad of flowers that were brought together by the honeybees for this comb.  It spreads gloriously for miles--honey in the morning.