Bees!!!!

Here we go again.  I told the story of the "Accidental Beekeepers"  in this post.  The feral hive that lived in our roof eaves for years was removed.  The beekeeper/contractor who we hired to cut them out, accidentally put the queen in the colony after he sprayed her with insecticide in the roof. He was trying to kill any bees he didn't remove so they didn't recolonize in the roof. OOPS.  Three days later, the whole colony died.  Then we bought a hive from a local IFA store  We later discovered that it hadn't really been taken care of very well when we got it; not very many bees. I don't think we fed it enough either and it absconded, which in beekeeper terms means the colony didn't like the accommodations we provided and moved on to greener pastures. This year, armed with more knowledge and hard won experience,  we are trying again; this time with two hives so we can compare the two.

The kitchen garden is providing some nice pollen and nectar right now.  The poppy pollen is bright orange.  It looks nice in the bee frames next to the bright yellow of the dandelion pollen.

One hive is stronger than the other but both are gaining in population and the queens are laying. We've had at least one hatch and this weekend I'll put a second brood box on each hive. The colony needs to more room to grow so the queen has comb to lay new eggs. The average life of a field bee (the foragers that collect nectar for honey) is about 3-4 weeks this time of year. They literally work themselves to death.  It takes 3 weeks for an egg become a bee so it's important the queen is laying well.

There is a great deal of pollen and nectar now and the hives are thriving so cross your fingers and hope we do better this time around.

This starling and his mate pulled out some mortar from the ice house eaves and they have a nest full of baby birds under the roofline.  The bird on the ridge was watching me pretty carefully with a worm in his beak.

And here's a photo of one the beekeepers.  Don't tell him I posted his photo though.  He's camera shy.
We both use a full bee suit when I open up the hive. B's allergic to bee stings and I just don't like getting them!  I could sit all day watching the hives and I don't use a suit for that.

This is the way to "mow" a lawn/pasture in my opinion.  Our neighbor, Peter, borrows his friend's sheep for the weekend. Love this breed and their black faces.
That's a pretty nice view from our back garden, don't you think?

Rain....glorious rain!

I tuned in to local TV news on this morning and the announcer said.....

"It's a sad, wet commute today.  Rainy and wet, and a bit colder."

Huh....sad?????? Not a chance!  We are the 2nd driest state in the USA folks.  Our high temperatures have been in the 90's and the low has been in the 70's and 80's for the last few weeks.  That's Farenheit folks! It's been HOT, HOT, HOT.  The grass is dry, the garden is dry, and the rain is a blessing. I wish it would rain for days and days. It's lovely outside. The air smells fresh and clean and I have all of the windows open wide in spite of a few errant drops coming through. The air is a bit crisper and it's not at all cold.  It's in the 70's. Its delightful and not in any way sad.

Hopefully, the rain will help the firefighters with containment of the many wildfires throughout the state.

As alarming as the smoke plume across the valley and over the mountain from The Homestead was, the orange sky and sunset glow made for a beautiful photo of the granary last weekend.

The rainy mist outside today reminds me of the weather we had in San Francisco last week.  The view from the Legion of Honor in Lincoln Park is lovely.  Can you see the Golden Gate Bridge peeking through the trees?  In my opinion this art museum is one of the loveliest places in the city. It overlooks the ocean and the Presidio.  And this is just the parking lot of the museum.  The art collection is amazing.

I must be off.  I've been taking a little break from cleaning out the freezer.  There's a lot to catch up on here.  I may have to get back to wall paper steaming today too.

Have a good week.

Fun in the Sun....

I've not been here at the blog for a while.  We've been busy.

 

There's been beekeeping, berry picking (and eating of course), jamming, some really good summertime menus, a bit of vacationing which included yarn and knitting of course,  there was some reading on the veranda.

It was hard to concentrate on anything but the Pacific view, but we managed to tough it out and sit on the veranda quite a bit, morning, evening, and through one slightly foggy afternoon.

There was some wallpaper stripping going on (and a lot more of it that has to happen, unfortunately).

There was even a summer birthday, which is new for our family.  It's fun to add son-in-laws and some new summertime celebrations.
I hope your summer is going as well as ours.  I'll be back.  I'm off for a bit again.