With 60+ newbies in our local beginner beekeeping class, we can safely say that beekeeping is enjoying a surge of popularity. The president of our area beekeeping association is bringing 150 packages of bees up from Georgia next Thursday; all are pre-sold to members. That’s about 1.8 million honeybees (includes one queen per package). An additional 50 packages will arrive the following week for close to 3 million bees. Wow.
I’ve planned to take the afternoon off (Beefest!) from work to pick my two packages up and promptly introduce them to their new homes. The official term is to "install" a package but that sounds kind of clinical to me. One installs carpet and mufflers, not honeybees. Anyhoo, I’ll have six hives total!
I rarely remember to take my camera with me when working with the bees, but managed a couple of pics last week.
White tube socks serve a number of purposes. Pull them up over pant legs to keep wandering bees out (a very exciting situation indeed). Also, white’s good – bees seem much less concerned with light colors than dark (a good guideline in beekeeping apparel: try to not look like a bear). Bonus: they’re super sexy.
"Where did you get that pollen?" No, really, that’s what’s going on here. Check out the "Waggle Dance" video (perfectly safe for work).
Other possibility: "Does this pollen make my butt look big?"