"It is well to remember that the entire population of the universe, with one trifling exception, is composed of others." A.Holmes

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Spot On My Bee-Keeper

~My Bee-keeper, my honey, my husband! He and our oldest son have kept bees for many years...and after our son left home for the Marines and his own family, my bee-keeper kept the bees. My bee-keeper tends our gardens, orchards, and me! He loves to share the secrets of his bees with any who are interested. He shares the harvest of his bees with family and friends. ~Last weekend the bees showed signs of swarming. When my Bee-keeper checked his hives he discovered the bees had grown in such number that they needed new boxes added to the hive to accommodate them. He added the boxes and so far things have settled down in the hive and they have not swarmed. Any who note the time I publish my blog post will notice I am a night-owl, and my precious Bee-keeper is not...this might very well sum up his view of the hours in a day, "Morning is the best of all times in a garden. The sun is not yet hot. Sweet vapors rise from the earth. Night dew clings to the soil and makes plants glisten. Birds call to one another.Bees are already at work." William Longwood

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

I am fascinated with your bees. Like your "bee-keeper," I am early to bed and early to rise. I love to get out in the garden while it's still cool.

Debbie said...

We've always had a keen interest in bees, but living in a the city puts a kabosh on that and chickens.
I purchase local honey through bee keepers and found daily consumption of local honey to be the cure for Spring allergies! YAY!
We are having a long, cool and rainy Spring. I enjoy your summer like environment. I did see my first hummingbird yesterday on one of my feeders and the oriole has quite disappeared:(

Shelley said...

I love hearing about your bee-keeping! I love the idea of fresh honey!

LindaSue said...

Like your husband - we are early morning people here also. Fascinated by the bee keeping - there are only a couple of local apiaries here.

Thistle Cove Farm said...

The honey and honey bee posts are always great! Please keep 'em coming -smile-. Also, please ask Jim his thoughts on CDC - Colony Collapse Disorder, I'm curious to know what he thinks.

Paula said...

Good thing your bee-man knows what to do.. I would have been clueless!
Loved the wonderful words about morning time... I'm a morning person, too.

noble pig said...

So neat. I always wondered how you would curtail a swarm, now I know.

I bet the honey is delicious.

Lanny said...

Argh, I am catching up all at once here. It seems that your bees have invaded my computer because three times now in the last couple of days when I go to comment on your blog I freeze up and have to shut down and by the time I get back up my attention span has been broken by something, usually in the form of a young girl!

I believe your bees come all the way down to my garden. I could have sworn I heard a group of them talking on the raspberry vine last year. They seemed to be all a buzz about the wonderful keeper that they have, and how his beard matches his outfit he wears and his wife that takes a lot of pictures of them. Clearly they were speaking of you and yours!

I am starting to change over to my "summer" hours. I am never really thrilled to get up early in the winter but I love to get up early in the late spring and on into autumn, the switch over is begining to get a little rough though.

Jo said...

Omigosh, you always have such interesting things on your blog. Did I happen to tell yuo -- you are living my life -- the life I have always wanted, in any case.

Wonderful...!

I am a morning person too. I love to wake up to the sun pouring through my window, and the seagulls squawking outside.

A. Joy said...

Wow - that picture of the hive with all of those bees is great! It almost looks like the hive sneezed and sprayed out a bunch of bees. Send some bees this way please!!!! maybe give them some tiny little maps on how to get to our fruit trees???

Connie said...

Great photos, Kathy. I'm glad your beekeeper has a real beard instead of a beard made out of bees like you always see in that one photo. :) That always kind of freaked me out. HA!

Having your own fresh honey must be wonderful!