Sunday, March 30, 2008

Pleased as Punch

I am happy to announce that I am the proud owner (at least temporarily) of a hive of bees. Yes, Saturday was the happy arrival date. I drove to Nelson County to pick up my dad, then we meandered the back way through some pretty stunning countryside all the way to Shipman. Where we picked up two 3# boxes of bees (complete with Italian Queens). We all rode back to Pop's farm, where we did a quick installation of his hive and then I high tailed it back to The City where Cho-girl met me a few minutes after my arrival. Documentation extraordinaire! My house mate also witnessed the installation. It was quick and to the point. Pry open the box, remove the can of syrup, uncork the Queen cage an dump in the bees. There were a few tense moments when the Queen came charging out of the cage, which isn't supposed to happen, there is supposed to be a candy barrier that the bees eat away to release her, but I guess she managed to eat it all herself while in transit. It was a close thing. It could have been ciaou bella, but I think I got her in the hive. I went to check them later in the day and they did seem to be hovering around the hive and the strays left in the cage had gone - presumably into the hive. They sent a guard bee out to check me out. I guess I was standing around too much...Pretty suspicious like, you know? But they seemed to determine that I was not a bear and left me alone. That they were so organized only a few hours after installation gives me hope that they are settling. I haven't checked on them today yet. I thought I would wait for the effing sleet to stop first.

Before:


During:


After:


You can get the full gallery here, at least for a while.... THANKS CHO!!

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Yer so cute!

starrhillgirl said...

Wow! How do I get on the honey gravy train? Loan you more books?

Elsie said...

Let's just keep the fingers crossed for now. There are miles to go before we sleep in this particular endeavor... How many miles til next May/June? But in preparation.... books are good. Enchiladas are very good.