Bees
I’ve written before about the impact of massive honeybee collapse in the US. Honeybees have never had an easy time here: they’re European imports and the climate isn’t favorable to them. The bees are largely farmed, and are vulnerable to disease, blight, and other troubles. The latest die off is more troubling, as the managed communities are simply disappearing for no discernable reason.
However ill-suited the European honeybee is to the US, in many areas feral colonies have held on: somewhere on my block, probably in the maple tree next door, there’s a colony. And boy have they been enjoying my yard, where they can enjoy coriander, basil, thistle, and (easiest to photograph) sunflowers. Click each shot for a better look.
3 Responses to “Bees”
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July 30th, 2007 at 9:52 am
I am so jealous of your garden!
Looks like all that lugging and digging paid off, huh?
BTW, I almost took a course on ‘Beginning Beekeeping’ recently, but it filled up. Now I am mildly obsessed with the idea of keeping hives of my own…or rather, playing landlord to a swarm.
July 30th, 2007 at 10:34 am
We’ve worked really hard to cultivate flowers that attract bees and butterflies here. They love both the sedum and the coneflowers. Luckily, both are easy to propagate and drought-tolerant, so we spread them around the yard and have lots of bees everywhere, happily gathering away.
July 30th, 2007 at 4:16 pm
If you’re using the Nikon Coolpix I gave you, I believe it has what’s called a macro function which allows for very close up shots.
You should check it out. Then you can take pictures like this.