Permanent beeswax room coming to the Phillips Gallery in DC.

Yes, a beeswax room. Described here in the Washington Post. One huge problem with the article is that it never even mentions bees. The bees that produced all the wax to be used.  Bees get no respect.

Projected installation date is early 2013 and I'll be there. I wonder if it will smell like beeswax? And how will they keep people (like me) from touching the walls?

Photo credit: Wolfgang Laib or Sperone Westwater (confusing caption). The Post will probably make the photo disappear anyway. Copyright infringement. It's complicated in the Internet copyright world.

Honey harvester for a day. (More like for a morning.)

That's what I got to be a few weeks ago, on a Saturday morning after a big storm. I was with members of the Franciscan Monastery Garden Guild, extracting honey from the 14 hives they keep on the Monastery grounds. I met the head beekeeper a week or so ago, and I helped him move some frames of bees from one hive to another. It was the first time I've had on The Veil and Worked The Bees since I gave away my hive in May 2011. Extracting the honey great fun. We had no electricity but that didn't interfere with the project, every step of which requires no electricity. The tasks ranged from carrying (into an upstairs work room) the big heavy boxes of honey-filled frames, to carefully scraping off the top layer of wax on each frame, to hand-spinning the frames in those metal contraptions, to pouring the honey into a bucket with a screen on it, to pouring that filtered honey into bottles, to labeling the bottles. It was great fun.

The honey is sold in the gift store for the Monastery.  And each volunteer got a bottle of honey and here's mine! Tasty. It would be nice to make honey my only sweet, replacing store-bought cookies and chocolate and ice cream and pies and blahblahblah, but that's oh-so unlikely. (And it's too bad I put my wet thumb over the label.)

How great is this? SF Friend M. becomes a foster beekeeper.

It's a long story, which I'll report later. Margo lives in San Francisco in a really old house. Details to follow.

[note: I'm trying to type using only one space between sentences; mostly I'm forgetting, so I have to go back and delete one space -- very annoying]

Empty house in the neighborhood.

I'm this close to getting bees again. But the days roll by and I don't make the phone call to order a nuc* so maybe I don't really want a hive again. My hesitation is about the irrational worry that the bees will sting someone and cause a serious reaction.

But I like the look of the beehive in my backyard. I moved it about 5 feet farther away from my house (compared to the location of my previous hive). And it's facing slightly more away from the back of the house, more southeast, which is fine. But the hive entrance doesn't face a nice open area like my first hive -- I have to think of a name for that hive... I never understood why people named their hives but now I do.

Meanwhile, under our back porch are these bee holes and I don't know what kind of bees are using them. They are not yellow jackets but they might be miner bees. But they are larger than honeybees and I've read that miner bees are the size of honeybees. They aren't very aggressive but they buzz around just enough to let you know that they know you're on their turf. Harmless. But what are they? They move way too fast for me to get a picture. Last year they were gone by mid-summer I think.


*The term “nuc” is short for nucleus colony. A nucleus colony is just a very small colony of a few thousand bees and a queen.

Candle-making! At last. I have more wax cappings to melt but first I need to buy lots of stockings. It takes a lot -- it's a messy business. But fun.

I think these pictures pretty much tell the story of my maiden attempt at candle-making. I know I wasted some wax because I let too much of the stocking stuffed with the clean burr comb sink under the hot water. That caused a lot of the melted wax to stick to the stocking and it had to be thrown out.

Beeswax. For me to play with and maybe make candles with.

When Steve, my beekeeping neighbor, took away my hive (sob) I vowed that I wouldn't give up all the beekeeping activities I had planned. Candle making was one of those activities, so I asked Steve if I could have the wax leftovers from his honey harvesting. Here they (it?) are (is?). What you see are one nice clean piece of cappings and a whole lot of wax mixed with bee parts, honey, and propolis. I'm going to follow the advice found in the book Plan Bee by Susan Brackney. I'll stuff bits of this into old pantyhose, put the stuffed pantyhose into a pot of water, heat the water until the wax rises to the top, wait for it to cool, and then lift off a disk of pure wax. That's the theory at least. Then I'll slowly melt that wax and pour it into candle molds that I bought back in the days when I dreamed of being a real beekeeper. Before I learned that I'm a wus about the whole thing.

So so silly.

Every year the Gonzo Scientist blog, associated with Science magazine, sponsors a dance video contest. Entrants must do an interpretive dance that is supposed to communicate their PhD topic. This year one of the entries is by a biology researcher doing his dissertation on robbing behavior in honeybees.

Guarding and Robbing Behavior in Social Insects from Michael Smith on Vimeo.

Carpenter bee, I think.

All summer long I've been wowed by the huge bumblebees at my flowers. But I don't think they were bumblebees...carpenter bees is what I now think. Huge!

I'm so not in the blogging mood. I write blog posts in my head but never put them here.

I love finding a box in the mail. Especially when it has local honey in it.

Thanks to the hard work, and generosity, of Kathy at No Rhyme or Reason I have this beautiful and delicious honey. Here's her very interesting post on her honey harvesting this year. If I can't or won't have my own home-harvested honey, I know I can depend on the kindness of bloggers. My plan is to use it on toast. But first I have to find some other daily food or meal to give up because once I start eating this honey on toast I'll overdo it, as is my foodie way.
Thanks again Kathy!

One of my froggies. He lives in the pond that my bees used as their personal water fountain last year. And a note about the Denver County Fair.

A few days ago Kitt from Denver reported on the Denver County Fair. Here's a second review from the New York Times. Kitt out-reports The Times because she mentioned the fried Fruit Loops and the performance by Devo.

This time last year I was gearing up to work at the Montgomery County Fair, where I co-manned/personed a bee demonstration booth for a 4-hour shift (or was it 3 hrs but felt like 4?). It was hot as blazes, I knew very little, and although I'm glad I did it, I decided not to do it again this year. Maybe next year. I still think of myself as a beekeeper. Yesterday I was strafed a couple of times by buzzing insects that were either bumblebees or other bee-like creatures. I was unfazed, as usual, but if it had happened last year I would have assumed it was one of my honey bees and that she was angry about something and that I needed to find out why she wasn't happy and do something about it. Now. [Sort of like an over-protective mother. I should know.]

My answer to the question posed by this beekeeper is "yes."

I'm still reading all the emails from my local beekeeping group. This popped up yesterday. I apologize to all the successful beekeepers out there who may read this, because I am definitely still pro-bee even though my two most recent posts about bees were kinda negative. But I do think this lady should re-consider. I'm not sure if she's a physician or not. She needs an editor, but who doesn't? I know that she loves her bees. And may be a bit of a risk-taker.


"My sting reactions have been getting progressively worse ...and yesterday I was hospitalized shortly, not because of anaphylaxis, but because my diaphragm went into spasms, interrupting my breathing about 10 minutes after a second sting while top feeding (the stings WERE my fault and I have not been very good at wearing protective gear). I was fine after all the usual treatments, but told that the next time I get multiple stings I may not make to the ER even with an Epipen.

"... I have put a lot of time, effort and love (not to mention $) into my 2 hives and they are doing very well. I hate to give them up and was looking for some feedback from beekeepers. I am well aware that physicians do their best to strike fear into one's heart, and as a physician know that they do speak some truth, but may not understand bees or their upkeep.

"I will be starting immuntolerance therapy and am ordering more serious protective gear. Am I crazy for wanting to keep this up?"

Photos: two of the very, very few nasturtiums I got this year. I love them (modest, edible, and totally deer-proof) but am not very successful with them. Too little water? Too few (or too many) nutrients? Too little (or too much) sun? My ignorance about them is huge.

Beekeeper Steve, who inherited my aggressive hive in May, reports the following event in his back yard, less than 3 miles from my house.

"...I went to another location around 4:15 (it was 100 degrees) to feed a … hive. The goal was to open the outer cover, remove the screened inner cover, pry the floats from the hive top feeder, feed, reassemble & go. I removed the outer cover & all was well. The feeder and inner cover was covered and packed with bees. I sprayed them with sugar syrup and pried the inner cover off and gently set it on the outer cover...they were agitated by this and started bumping me so I walked about 100 yards away & they stopped pursuit. I gave myself a moment and went back to release the floats & pour in 2 gallons of syrup. When I arrived back they were still agitated so I decided just to pour the syrup into the feeder & call it a day....well I got 1/4 into 1 gallon and I was covered by bees (literally) I walked away....I walked 1/4 mile (seriously) away from the hive before they were no longer stinging & bumping me....I gave myself another minute but decided to finish the job....I went back....poured the remainder of the 2 gallons, put it back together and was stung countless times....I had to walked over 1/4 mile away from the hive & there were still stragglers stinging & bumping....I counted over 120 stings in my suit and had about 20 stings that found their way into my skin....

"Since this hive built its way up to 3 mediums it has been more aggressive than my others but I have never experienced such a thing. It was like what you see on TV. I felt like I was on an episode of "I survived" and started to re-think all of the poor decisions that got me to this point - I'm guessing time of day, extreme heat & dearth contributed but dang! I have no plans of going back into that hive until September!"

The bee mailbox isn't mine -- it's in my neighborhood and awfully cute but I don't dare get one. It's such a great target for roaming teens with baseball bats. Not that I ever see such beings on my street but late into the night I know some drive down this way occasionally.

While I'm sure the above story is true, I kinda doubt that Steve had to walk 1/4 mile from his home. That's a long way, but I do believe it FELT like 1/4 of a mile under those circumstances.

I miss my bees, but this experience is precisely why I gave them away. I want to be a beekeeper but I'm simply not brave enough (or strong enough).

Pollen-gagged?

Here are my notes from the last beekeeping meeting I attended in April. The Montgomery County (MD) Beekeepers Association meets monthly, and for a year I went dutifully to each meeting. I learned tons and tons, especially from the oldtimers and the newbies. After I decided last month, very suddenly, to give away the hive I looked back at these notes. "Pollen-gagged" hives? Yikes! Was that my problem? Parachlorobenzene? Sounds delicious. See all those exclamation points and question marks? See how I tried to create a logical "strategy" and I stopped at No. 2?

I'm posting these notes so I can remind myself occasionally how complicated all of this is. I know, I know, it's not rocket science. But it's pretty damn close. And rocket science is, after all, a science -- you can measure things precisely and compare things precisely, etc. Beekeeping is an art. And I'm no artist. (But I do miss my girls.)

Bees in lower Manhattan, Little Italy. No word on how this was resolved.

Photo from Gawker.com. Aren't they beautiful?
Thanks to Robin for alerting me to this.

And then they were gone. Except for a couple of hundred lost souls who still linger around the hive site.

So last Thursday night, May 26, a beekeeper acquaintance Steve came by in his borrowed pick up truck and took away my babies. It was the right decision. But that doesn't mean I'm happy about it. Steve reported a few days later that his little kids were being chased around his back yard by my mean girls. He has 2 other hives that have never bothered his kids, so I guess it's fair to say I DID have a slightly aggressive hive.

I concluded that they had to leave my house when both Doug and I found that we couldn't do much of anything in the back yard during the afternoon, especially the late afternoon. It was one thing for me to abandon outdoor activities in deference to the bees, but it was another to ask Doug to do the same. Plus, for the entire summer I would be worrying anytime a friend was in our back yard. I could no longer say "oh don't worry about the bees, they won't bother you."

Steve believes the hive doesn't have a queen (which maybe explains the bees' aggressiveness???), but now that's his problem not mine, and I confess to being happy that it's not my problem. I'm not sure I'm done with beekeeping. But I'm definitely not doing anything this summer...maybe next spring I'll revisit the situation. Or maybe I'll find some place nearby where an owner will let me keep a hive -- a church, a house with a very large yard, a nursing home -- and I can still be the primary beekeeper and visit often.

Meanwhile, I'm told that the lingerers won't stay longer than a week after the hive was removed, so that gives these girls 2 more days before I expect them to fly away. Or will they? I read that burning incense, lots and lots of incense, will drive them off. I need Joss Sticks. Plenty of Asian markets in this area. I'll search them out if the girls don't leave soon.

Boo hoo.

Bee Report: A Psychological Tale.

The short story is this: my hive swarmed in late April, and I still don't know if I have a laying queen -- a queen who has had a successful mating flight and is now safely inside the hive laying eggs.

The last time I looked inside, early May, this is what I saw. I didn't linger long enough to fully search for eggs. Still too much of a nervous nellie. But I may do an inspection today. It's also a perfect day for a swarm...nice quiet sunny day after many days of off-and-on rain and winds. The irony is (I think it's an irony) that if I do have a swarm today it means I DO/DID have a queen.

From the outside, the hive behaves perfectly normally. Lots of bees coming and going, guard bees chasing me away if I bother them, even a little bearding on the few warmish humid nights we've had.

I call this post a psychological tale because this hive still drives me crazy. Obviously, the condition of a beehive is not knowable except for those rare times when a human rudely and cruelly rips off the top of the hive and pulls out the frames, destroying comb, squishing bees and larvae, spilling honey. Oh it's a mess when I examine a hive. So I try not to inspect very often. Instead I worry, and read, and muse, and ponder about my beehive. Should I re-queen even though I don't know if I need to? How can I get up the courage to do a good, full inspection? The stacked hive boxes are really, really heavy so why am I risking my back health by not buying a bee veil and jacket for Doug or Greg, both of whom have offered to help me lift the damn things? Can you spell stubborn?

I think I've probably said all of this a dozen times on this blog, but I'm not going to go back and check. I apparently need to say it quite often.

Not a clue about what's going on inside there.

Top picture taken after my 10:30 AM hive inspection. Bottom picture taken just before inspection.

What did I find? Well, I found a lot of bees, moderately upset at my invasion but not overly so. I found a lot of either honey or syrup. I found some weirdo hard black capped something: dead brood? honey gone bad? dunno. I didn't see queen cups, and I didn't even look for the queen. Am I going to pull out 40 frames and look at each one carefully to see if there's one there? No way. It's all I can do to keep the damn smoker smoking. I saw a little pollen. All 40 frames in the bottom 4 boxes were filled. Five box, on top, had some nice comb but just a tiny bit. No sign of hive beetles, no bad smell. Swarm was now 5 days ago. Could a queen-less colony stay this populated for 5 days without a queen? dunno. Will the existing workers make a new queen? dunno. If they don't have brood they won't.

Am I discouraged? you betcha. Did I get a sting on my big toe? you betcha. Was I wearing socks and sandals instead of socks and shoes? you betcha.

Next step: take a shower, go work at the library for my volunteer day, and forget about the damn bees for 4 or 5 hours.

I want my girls to come home. At about 6 PM they were settling in for the evening.

I know they won't come home. I hope they find a nice hollow in a tree nearby and stay in the neighborhood. And I guess this is goodbye to my original queen, who had a nice blue spot on her back so I could find her. If there's a new queen she'll be unmarked of course. I doubt if I'll ever see her.

Swarming is natural. But beekeepers try to avoid swarms in order to keep the hive strong so it will produce more honey (I guess that's the primary reason). Swarms are said to occur in the spring, often when the hive is crowded, but I just read an article in the April 2011 issue of the American Bee Journal in which the author, Peter Loring Borst (isn't that a great name for a bee expert?), said:
"...given all the 'right conditions,' some colonies swarm and some don't. Beyond that, some honey bee colonies swarm under circumstances that to their owners seem downright foolish. What it boils down to is this: the most you can say is that there are times when bees are more liable to swarm than others."

Little movie about my little swarm.

Go to about 55 minutes on this video to see the swarming action. I wasn't sure what exactly I was focusing on so it's not a great video, but you can hear them buzzing like crazy.

7:30 PM and the swarm still sits there high in a maple tree. The temperature is supposed to go down only to about 60 tonight so I guess they'll survive.

Swarm? I guess so.

It happened at about 2:30. Actually, it's still happening because the small swarm cluster is out there (4 PM) and who knows how long it will be there or where it will eventually go.

I'm going to build some more frames to put in a box in the very unlikely event they decide to live there -- something I procrastinated on all winter and now regret.

Things I don't about this swarm but am not going to worry about:
1. Is the queen with them?
2. Is a new queen installed in the hive? Or are a couple of them battling it out? (I DID see queen cups when I inspected the hive last Monday.)
3. Will the cluster get any larger? It seems so small compared to pictures I've seen.
4. Will it come home? Two beekeepers in my local association report that bees will sometimes do that.


Things I DO know: I'm not getting on any ladders to save swarms. And this one is way, way the hell up over the center of my small back yard lawn area so there's no way anyone could safely get it.

It was exciting. The sound of it was wonderful! But I have no idea what's going on and I'm sorry but that still gets under my skin.

Video coming in next post I hope.