This is a two part post today. If your not interested in bees just skip to the gardening portion of this post.
Today I did an inspection of the bee hive, the bees got very angry. Below is a video of the bees when they were angry. I got stung in the back of the neck twice, it took more than two hours for the pain to go away. I'm sure it could have been a lot worse.
Here is two photos from the honey super on top of the hive. You can see some brood and capped honey. I even found a bee emerging from this frame.
Below is what the top on the main brood box looked like after I opened it, lots of bees! The deep box that was on top of this was very heavy with syrup/honey, I did not even look at one frame in it, the bees were too upset by the time I wanted to look.
Likely 8 out of ten frames looked like this in the brood box, no complaints.
On this frame I saw the blond Italian queen several times but never managed to get a photo of her, the bees were pretty mad. I did see fresh eggs, lots of larva and capped brood. Pollen stores were OK, not as full as I'd liked to have seen. Honey/syrup perhaps 90 pounds plenty enough for winter. I saw maybe 12 beetles and no beetle larva, which I feared I'd see lots of. I did see my first bee with a mite on her back.
The bees chased me away three times before I closed up the hive in haste. I had maybe 20 bees climb into the smoker and cook themselves they were so actively flying all about. I'm sure anyone in the yard would have been stung, never seen my bees this mad. I was 50 foot from the hive relighting the smoker and the bees were swirling all around me, three times they did this. After everything was sealed up maybe 20 minutes later I was attacked by a bee in the front yard, the hive is in the back yard. So my bees are healthy...
Here are two kinds of fall crocus blooming in the garden. The one below will you look at those antlers! The third kind of fall crocus we have was in my last post Saffron Crocus, it is done, the rains did it in.
Gourds, the flowers are Megs gourds, you can see our only tiny gourd this year, so sad. Above is two swan gourds I picked up at a garden center nearby, these are 15- 8 inches long pretty big.
I took this Japanese Anemone photo this morning, I did not even notice the crab spider on it.
Below is Leslie Ann our newest camellia, need to find a place to plant this beauty.
Last thing I'm 100 % behind the protests on Wallstreet, this makes me one of the 99%. I know many of you might think I'm crazy, I have joined Occupy Durham, I was the 15th member to join. If your interested in learning more see what Senator Bernie Sanders
has to say about it. Full coverage can be found on this
page with lots of videos and op-eds. I really think it is time for change. Did you know in the past 30 years middle class America (republicans included) their income has grown
21 % not adjusted for inflation. Do you know how much the richest 400 persons income went up? Are you thinking 50% or 100%, no not even close. Sit down and take a deep breath, are you ready scroll down?
1600 percent!!
Yes 1600% and they get all the tax breaks and have loop holes. Please watch
Elizabeth Warren's video talking about corporations and taxes.
