Events in our yard

Katie helped Grandma harvest the honey from the hive that had died. It was pretty dirty honey, I don't know what was going on with the bees but the honeycombs were filled with bee bread and big hunks of pollen. It took a while for the honey to get strained out.

 Katie was a little afraid of the garbage can bees, the bees were pretty riled up. But she suited up for a picture and then ran down the hill.

The Bee Saga Continues

Well last week a friend of ours gave us a garbage can full of bees. Lucky for us Eric and Katie were visiting because Eric likes bees!  Eric helped GrandBob to open up a garbage can. Quite the excitement, as millions of bees poured out of the can and then flew around our yard quite confusedly. There was a lot of honeycomb in the can but not really too much honey. Eric was pretty lucky because he only got stung one time, a bee snuck up his pants.

 This morning I was up on the hill checking the bees and I noticed that bees were pouring out like liquid from their hive and congregating in front of it. They were flying around in a pretty distinct pattern, which I recognized as a swarm getting ready to fly off. I told GrandBob, but there was nothing we could do to stop our bees from leaving their hive. Luckily we spotted them congregating in a tree behind our fence. We'll keep checking on them to see what they're doing.

Bees

Last week Uncle Ryan and Grandma opened up the beehive, removed the old honey and put a bee phermone into the upper hive. The smell attracts bees to hives, so we are hoping to catch a swarm and have another active hive.

 Well guess what? The phermone did attract a new queen and we got a small swarm inside the hive. Eric shows the bees surrounding the queen on the frame.

 Grandma tells Eric how to remove the clump of bees from the frame and put them into the top of the honey super. It worked, so hopefully the bees will be happy and not leave their new home.

Discovery in the lemon tree

 Grandma decided to prune her lemon tree today. Guess what she discovered hiding way up in the top of the tree? Yes, there was a blue jay's nest.

 She took the nest out of the tree because blue jays are very aggressive, mean birds and they chase all the other birds out out their territory. She doesn't want blue jays in her yard. The blue jays were squawking loudly today telling her not to take away their nest. Inside the nest was 4 beautiful brown/blue eggs.

Zoey had a great day today chasing the chickens. She wishes she could come up to the top of the hill where they were hiding from her.