The Latest Buzz

These flowers were planted for my brother-in-law Jeff’s bees.

A few weeks ago, Jeff let me dress up in some protective clothes to get close to his bee hive.

I was pretty excited about it.

Jeff started the smoker. The smoke helps to calm the bees.

Calm bees are good.

Jeff, my mom, and I traipsed back to the hive. My sister Lynn and my nephew Kevin followed to take pictures. They were wearing shorts and tank tops. Really.

The first step was using the smoke to calm the bees.

The bees build honeycomb and fill it with honey.

The female bees do all the work. They have about a two mile range to gather pollen. The drones are the males and their job is to mate with the queen. The queen is in charge and lays eggs.

If I were a bee, I’d prefer to be the queen.

I’ve been fascinated by honey bees since I was young and my dad had hives but I’ve never been this close before.

Jeff is very knowledgeable about his hive even though it’s his first year of beekeeping.

If I’d remember half of what he said, this would be a much more interesting post.

That’s my latest buzz.