What? No hive air conditioners! What kind of beekeeper am I?

Heat wave strikes!  Temps over 100 degree F.

People run to their houses or cars to stay cool.

Bees?  Well, let's just say they "Hang Out".

They also spend a great deal of time around the pond.  Not cooling off like we do, but gathering much needed water for the hive.

Geneva, our 3-year old sweetheart girl, noticed some of the bees ended up in the water.  At dinner she wanted to pray, and prayed that the Lord would "help the bees in the water."

The pictures above are from the few hives I keep in the back yard. (Note to all beekeepers:  if you place hives in the back yard of your home, make sure the hives and all supers are painted nicely.  This will save your wife the trouble of informing you they are not!)

In my bee yards I have placed water tubs.  I am attempting to give the bees a source of water close to the hives to preserve their wings from unneeded flight time.  This also helps to keep the bees out of neighboring ponds, pools, bird baths, etc. 

Of Grubs and Miniature Beekeepers

Our little lady, Geneva Hope, has been our "farm's" mascot (pictured on our main page in the bee costume) for 2 years. It is time now to pass the costume down to baby sister, who has just turned a year old.
But that is just fine with 3 year old Geneva, for she proudly announces that she isn't a honeybee at all!
"Me a Gwub now," is what she proclaims when it is her turn to help on the 3 hives we keep by our backyard pond. 

A bee starts off as an egg, then larva, followed by pupa (which Geneva calls a grub) and ends up as an adult worker, field bee, drone, etc, but Geneva is doing it the other way around - giving up her bee costume for a "gwub one" - she does indeed look very like a little squished up larvae in her white bee suit, gloves, veil, boots that are all 4 sizes too big!

May she long enjoy being Daddy's little helper in the beeyards.

So the bee flourisheth (about 42 days)

For He knoweth our frame - He remembereth that we are dust.

As for man, his days are as grass; as a flower of the field, so he flourisheth.

For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone, and the place thereof shall remember it no more.

 But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear Him, and

His righteousness unto children's children,

To such as keep His covenant and those that remember His commandments to do them.

Psalm 103:14-18

A worker bee in the summer will live for about 4 to 6 weeks.

In that time she will produce about 1/12th teaspoon of honey!

I guess that is why it is so good to the last drop.