Bee Swarm

Mr B is working frantically in my garage, hammering and painting; building beehives . 

There I was just sloping around my domain on Tuesday when a commotion started up around the beehive.  It needed closer inspection but I got dragged indoors and could only watch through the window.  Bees came out and started whirling around like a mini-dust storm and then the backyard filled up with bees flying about in a big cloud.  At the beginning Mr B thought maybe a new queen was going on a mating flight but it soon became clear they were shaping up to swarm.

Swarming is apparently nature's way of generating more bee colonies.  Some stay behind in the old place, and some 'emigrate' as it were, to set up a new bee city.  We don't know whether they have swarmed or were just testing out the idea.  It was a rainy day so they might not have actually left yet.  We hope.

That's why he is building new bee-hives.   He's is going to have to climb into that crazy suit again and do an 'artificial' swarm:- give some of the bees a new place to live before they go and find one for themselves. 

Supervising

Our lime trees have got leaves on them now.  The bees will be making lime honey soon. 

We saw a woodpecker in the lime tree on Wednesday and Mr B photographed it.  There are blue tits flying in and out of the bird box up there too.  I can see them from the upstairs bedroom window.  So close ......but soooooo far out of reach! 

I got picked up by the scruff yesterday just as I pounced on a sparrow on my back concrete.  The insult!  The disrespect! 

And it got away!