It’s getting quite late in the year for mowing lawns, but I’ve been putting it off for several weeks waiting for the leaves to fall so they would be mulched up. Of course most have fallen a fe weeks ago and I couldn’t even use the ‘bee work’ excuse as to why it hasn’t been done. So this past weekend I finally got around to it. Pumped up the now completely flat tire on the tractor (another item on the needs-fixed list). The day was cool in the low 40′s and overcast, promising rain later in the day. So the bees were all tucked in quite nicely and weren’t likely to get stirred up by the exhaust from the tractor that blows out the side of the engine cover. A good time to mow the bee yards.
Not a good time, however, to zip though the bee yards not paying attention where the ends of the landscaping timbers the hives were sitting on are. The bees quickly let me know that they were less than happy with the new orientation of their hive, flat on it’s back. Fortunately the hive boxes were firmly stick together with propolis so it was a quick matter of setting the hive upright as hundreds of bees pored out the front entrance. Given the temperature few took to the air and were back in the hive as nothing had happened a few minutes later. Sorry, no pictures. It’s just not the kind of thing you run back to the house to get a camera in the middle of.
