reward for your patience

the first hive of bees has been thriving in the weeks of beautiful weather we've had since matt installed them. here are some photos from the day he put the russian bees into their hive.

the bees arrive in a small screen box. matt then carefully extracts the queen cage, which contains the queen bee and a few helpers. the cage is sealed with a sugar candy plug. the bees eventually eat through the plug, freeing the queen. in a way, it's romantic. if i had to eat through a giant twizzler plug to free matt from a cage, i'd do it.

after placing the queen in her cage in the hive, matt then removes the large can containing sugar syrup that has provided food for the bees during their four days of containment in the screen box. this can is also the only thing preventing the 16,000+ bees from vacating their screen box- which they probably really want to do after being trapped in there for four days. and bees don't poop in their hive, which we suspect means they also don't poop in their screen box. needless to say, when they get out, they really have to go.


bee poop on my puffy coat.





what with the cold temperatures and the long confinement, the bees are not really ready to attack when they first leave the hive. this provides for some opportunity for up close observation. they are kind of cute and fuzzy.