Beekeeping Things: Ariele and Peter Look In A Wild Hive [Video Series]

This is me, vacuuming bees out of a wall in a house that is scheduled for deomolition.

One of the cool things my dad does is take bees out of people's houses. I've only done a couple of removals with him, but he's done tons. Bees like to make their homes anywhere that offers a cavity of a certain size that is also dry and safe. House, garage, and barn walls or between the floor and ceiling are the ideal nesting place for bees.

Many people try to kill colonies that have moved into their buildings with poison, rather than calling a beekeeper, because to remove a colony that has already started building comb and having babies takes a lot of time for the beekeeper, and the bees are not happy about it, making them defensive and sting-y. So beekeepers tend to charge for this type of work. 

In today's video, Dad removed a wild hive from someone's house and has put it in a hive box to see if it will survive the winter. You can see the comb that the bees built--Dad has placed it in the hive box so the bees won't lose their hatching brood.

I've also thrown together some photos of me and Dad removing bees from various places.

In this picture, Dad has ripped the siding from an old house and is working at removing the bees that have taken up residence inside. This ended up being 2 colonies and an 8-hour job.

In this picture, a massive swarm descended on the front yard of my parents' house and settled in the plum trees. It was 9 pounds of bees.

In this photo, Dad readies the smoker as we prepare to remove some of the supers to harvest honey.

This swarm decided that rather than move into a nice safe wall in somebody's house, they'd start building their comb in a tree. This is a rare occurrence where either they couldn't find a nesting place, or finding their home took so long they naturally started depositing comb on the branch. In cold climates building your house outdoors is an unwise course of action for the bees. Isn't the comb beautiful, though?

And there you have it: this week's Beekeeping Things! Stay tuned next week for some more wild and wonderful in the world of bees. Or check out last week's post: Beekeeping Things: Ariele and Peter Catch a Swarm [Video Series].

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Beekeeping Things: Ariele and Peter Catch a Swarm [Video Series]

Given the nature of my next book (beekeeping!), I have decided to dust off some old videos of me and my dad doing beekeeping things over the years. Now, this is going to be both embarrassing for me and nostalgic, and I am very much looking forward to it.

The first video is of me and Dad playing with a swarm before catching it. It includes sticking our hands in the swarm and getting stung. I was 19 or 20 in this video, and although you can't see it, I was not wearing shoes. Unless flipflops count as shoes, which I'm pretty sure they don't.

This is a bad habit that I have carried with me into my slightly older age. Eventually, Dad will scold me enough times that I feel compelled to wear shoes in his apiary.

The video is 8 minutes long, but the good bits are at 0:05, 0:58, 2:35, 5:15, 6:14, and 7:28. 

Enjoy :)

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The Trials and Tribulations of Rutherford the Unicorn Sheep

I recently came out with my first children's book: Rutherford the Unicorn Sheep Goes to the Beach. Cute, say the people that have picked one up so far (get your copy here!).

Well, last weekend I headed out to beautiful Western NY to do the photo shoot for the next book in progress: Rutherford the Unicorn Sheep... something to do with Beekeeping. It was fun, if tiring. I like hanging out with my parents, and of course I love doing bees with my Dad. But I encountered some difficulties I certainly didn't expect. 

1. My first batch of photos were entirely overexposed. Talk about stressful. I went back to the house after an hour and a half in the bee yard with some supposedly great photos, and sad, sad day, most of them looked like this: 

Very distressing. However, during the second half of the day, I fixed the issue and proceeded with much higher quality photos.

Lesson Learned: Buy a better camera and take some photography classes.

2. It was extremely hot. Now, I've worn a bee suit plenty of times in my life, but when you stop the work to take photos of everything that is happening, everything takes twice as long. This means wearing the bee suit for twice as long, not being able to drink water as often (due to the hat and veil), and still having to finish work despite the fact that you've been working all day. 

My Dad deserves a shout out at this point, for putting up with all my shenanigans, being patient and letting me taking a bajillion pictures of everything that was happening while I was simultaneously being less than helpful to him.

I got some great action shots of Dad looking all beekeeper-y.

Slightly warm would be an understatement, literally melting would be an overstatement.

We ended up getting a bunch of work done in the beeyard and also harvesting something like 50 pounds of honey. Not a huge amount, but still worthwhile. Plus it was gorgeous, light locust honey.

Lesson Learned: Drink more water and don't take pictures while doing bees in the middle of a hot summer day in a full bee suit.

3. I got stung. This is to be expected, when doing bees, particularly when you're like me and rather careless. I wore flipflops and one bee crawled up my pants and got me smack on the leg. The other one was an accident--I was balancing to take a picture and lost my balance and put my hand right down on a bee. Poor girl.

Bee stings are an interesting thing. There is a general sort of tension or fear of getting stung--even as someone who has been around bees my whole life--but once I got stung that second time, the tension completely went away. My dad says it goes away for him after the third sting, and he's been a beekeeper for decades.

This is the stinger that I pulled out of my leg. Pretty cool, huh? 

One time, when we were taking a colony out of a house, I got stung eleven times, but only the first three hurt. Apparently, I built up a temporary immunity to the venom. That's a nice feature of being a non-allergic human when you're harassing a well-built colony for hours. The swelling for my stings went down within a few hours, and the itching was gone by the end of the next day.

Lesson Learned: wear socks and shoes while beekeeping.

4. Skunks like to eat bees. This was definitely a problem. In addition to his hyper and excitable personality, I had to work extremely hard to prevent Wilfred the Walnut Skunk from eating every bee he came across. The Beekeeper was a great help in this regard, as Wilfred holds a great deal of respect for someone that can manage so many delicious snacks at once without giving into the temptation to binge. The Beekeeper assured him that he doesn't feel this particular urge, although bee venom is particularly banana-y, but Wilfred didn't really get it. Which is good, as it helped keep him in line.

At the end of the day, after Wilfred the Walnut Skunk had behaved himself, the Beekeeper did let him eat one drone. This was a huge treat, and the Beekeeper didn't mind as the drones are mostly useless.

He enjoyed the snack a great deal.

Lesson Learned: Don't take skunks into the bee yard.

5. I drove 8 hours for the photo shoot. Normally I try to combine trips like this with trips just to visit, but this time it didn't work out as I plan on releasing this book on September 19 at the Honey Harvest Open House in Howard, NY (put that on your calendar) and needed to move up my schedule. So I ended up driving 8 hours on a Tuesday afternoon, working in the bee yard for 1 day, and then leaving the next morning to drive back to NH. It was a loooong 3 days.

On the other hand, June is the absolute best time to visit upstate NY. Everything is green, the clouds are stunning, it's warm but not hot, cool but not cold, and generally the people are in a much better mood than any other time of year. Bonus plus: wild strawberries! Dad and I picked a few handfuls, and then my wonderful Grandma Sieling gave me 2 quarts of homegrown strawberries to take home with me. Double bonus plus: DUCKS! I love ducks.

It was definitely worth it.

Lesson Learned: Plan my business trips better and make time to have fun. 

Stay tuned for the release of the next Rutherford book - something about how he gets to go visit a beekeeper and meet bees! Or, you can see more sneak peek photos on Rutherford's own blog!

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Cat Memes from A to Z

It's Friday, so I'm going spend the next hour compiling a list of cat memes that in some way or another represent each letter of the alphabet, interspersed with some of the best, most relevant musical numbers from Phineas and Ferb. I came up with this idea in the middle of the night last night--I was dreaming about cats and the alphabet, so, good for me unconscious self.

And with no further ado...

A is for Airplane.

And for some in-flight entertainment.... Phineas and Ferb!

B is for Butter. And Biscuits. And Belly Rubs.

C is for Carl.

I know someone else named Carl.

D is for Dog.

A Platypus would be another useful pet.

E is for Elephant.

F is for Fast.

G is for Grills. And Grandparents.

Grandparents are the best. 

H is for Haters.

I is for Invisible.

J is for Jumping.

K is for Keyboard.

L is for Loaf.

M is for Meow. And Mere Cat.

N is for Ninja.

Already too late is right...

O is for Orange.

P is for Pie.

Q is for Quantum Mechanics.

R is for the Red Dot. 

Other red things include apples, clown noses, and rubber boots.

S is for Shoes.

More importantly, do the shoes have aglets?

T is for Tacos.

U is for Universe.

Phineas and Ferb go to space, make a moon farm, have a milkshake bar on an asteroid, help save aliens...

V is for Victorian. And Volume.

W is for Wet.

X is for X-Rays.

Y is for You.

Z is for Zombies.

In conclusion, adopt a cat and you will have cool internet pictures and an awesome roommate.

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The Umbrella Sonnet

Since I don't actually own an umbrella or own any photos of myself holding one, I opted to go outside and take this picture of me in the rain instead. I hope it is all you had ever hoped for.

In the spirit of digging through all of my old papers for yesterday's blog post, combined with the weather outside (gray, rainy, and cold), added to my new penchant for writing bad sonnets, I have decided to present to you The Umbrella Sonnet mentioned in yesterday's quiz, not once, not twice, but THRICE (that means three times)! Yes, such a treat.

The first rendition is that from my former self of old, the long forgotten college-age poetic genius I once was (this is sarcasm, btw). It fits into some structure that was not quite okayed by my lit professor. In other words, this is Draft 1.

Umbrellas

From my high perch I wake to see the rain
The breeze so softly carries wisps and traces
Of memories and of forgotten faces.
Below the ground bleeds with a coloured stain.
Circular wounds bleed on the crowded plain.
Flowing with the rain, battling time and space
They float towards their unnoticed hiding place.
They twirl and dance and dissipate as morning wanes.

My eyes effectively deceive! These wounds
Are not true wounds! Black, blue, red, white, and green
A myriad of colours, pattern'd blooms
Mix and match and blend a new and lovely screen
Harbor comfort from all the clouds that loom
O'er this glorious and momentary scene.

This rubber duck seems to be enjoying the rain a great deal. I think we should all strive to be a little bit more like this duck -- Philosophy by Ariele.

I cringed as I typed that. My thoughts went something like this: Is that how you spell wisps? Does the breeze really carry faces? Maybe I should've gone to the doctor. Or a scientist--something seriously seems to be wrong with the ground... OMG, I'm SO EXCITED THAT THE GROUND ISN'T ACTUALLY BLEEDING. "My eyes effectively deceive!" And 'pattern'd'! I really used the word 'Pattern'd'!

It doesn't even make sense.

Now let's take a gander at draft #2 with a format approved by my professor.

Umbrellas

From my high perch I wake to see the rain
Alighting on everything in my sight
I glance below and start with pure delight;
Spots cascade across the gray, wet plain.

These spots confuse my sleepy brain.
The colours blur, black, green, blue, yellow, white.
They move and dance in arbitrary flight,
Slowly dissipating as morning wanes.

I think, and then I finally can see
These spots that move gracefully without sound
Are quite common. I quite smile gleefully
For these instruments so petite and round
Protect the bearer from getting soggy
And look to be a sunset on the ground.

This one makes a little more sense at least, although I appear to have been easily confused back in the days of yore. Apparently, if you look down on umbrellas from above, they look like little colourful bubble ninjas running around everywhere. That said, I think it's much more boring than Draft 1. The metaphor that the earth is bleeding and my excitement over the fact that all is not as I imagined is much more interesting than this basic description.

I tried to get the rain in the sky behind me, but it mostly just looks like I'm confused and terrified that I'm being abducted by aliens. I guess the confusion didn't lessen with age.

So let's scurry on forward to the present day.

I give you this wonderful piece called "The Umbrella Sonnet," written by modern day Ariele (with an Ariele-approved structure), on the usefulness of an umbrella. In the air of transparency, I don't actually own an umbrella and perhaps I should never own one. I will leave that up to you to decide. 

At any rate, this poem was cobbled together with the hope that, at very least, it is more entertaining than my past self's versions. But seriously, counting syllables is hard although I am grateful that I only needed 10, as that is the same number as I have fingers. You should try writing a sonnet sometime. I dare you.

Anyway, enjoy :)

The Umbrella Sonnet

Umbrellas are good for so many things,
Like keeping hair dry or giving you wings
So you can fly on a wet, windy day,
And easily avoid car tire spray.

If you need to poke an enemy's eye,
An umbrella spike will let you be sly.
Umbrellas are good for clearing the way--
A live battering ram to part the fray.

Most importantly, an umbrella will
Look classy and rich with bowtie and twill,
Spats and a top hat, a cane and mustache,
And one last item--a large bit of cash.

You'll impress the ladies, men, and small kids
'Til the universe says you are lunch for a squid.

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