https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkNZ73ZiWx0
Turns out the compost bin we abandoned three years ago is full of bees. We noticed bees buzzing around our back deck. Then, last weekend, at the graduation party we were hosting, MR got stung. A trip to the doctor and a Prednisone prescription later, her finger is better but her fear is not. None of us like insects with stingers. Today, after much local research and the moral imperative to save the bees, Jim Hogg–loquacious beekeeper and public school teacher (“I save kids during the year and bees during the summer….”) came over and removed the bees. He kindly offered us a bee suit if we wanted to get an up-close look. He had no takers at our house. QR concocted his own narrative where “those bees eat the mosquitos that try to take my blood.”
Jim built bee boxes and a vacuum to pull them in for transport.
Yesterday, a backyard mini-safari identified the hive. It was found by following the “bee line.” Once he removed the bees today, they buzzed and buzzed. They were, he said, “busy bees.” Just as when a friend who keeps chickens explained to me that you have to introduce new hens methodically–because of the “pecking order”–I was reminded today of just how distant from the real world I often feel. Living in this first world luxury in Austin, working in an air-conditioned office and home, vicariously experiencing half my life via social media, no wonder I have no idea that the figures of speech I regularly use come directly from nature. Oh, the practicality of the physical world and our ancestors’ descriptions, which our grandparents then turned into metaphors so that we now call language abstract. But I digress. The bees were safely removed and made ready for transport to gardeners and beekeepers on a waiting list for bees. Ours were the best kind of bees, “the ones people want,” Jim said. We are so happy to contribute! And to be rid of them in the yard.
The honey takes on an orange hue from the Home Depot bucket.
Jim rests after removing the bees and preserving the honey.
The honey was preserved in an orange bucket from Home Depot. On the side it has the phrase “Let’s DO This!” After preserving the honey and boxing up the bees for transport. Jim regaled us with stories of the odd places from which he has extracted bees–the framing around a chimney, which gave the honey “a smokey taste.” Or perhaps, it gave the smoke a honey taste; his description indicated that the “finish” was honey and the rest of the taste was smoke. Then there was the hive near a flower garden that bloomed for much of the year with a variety of beautifully colored flowers. The honey in those combs took on the color of the flowers. He said it looked like a rainbow. Since honey contains all the local plant allergens, he says we can put it in our yogurt and rid ourselves of allergies. In Austin, where we wake with headaches and stuffy noses much of the year, we may be willing to give that a shot!
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