More Uninvited Visitors

It’s the heat of the day. My husband, who’s deathly allergic to bee venom, is out mowing the meadow.

I’m pottering around in the afternoon shade by the greenhouse, and my eyes are scanning (as they always do) the edges of the woods that surround the meadow. I have to be on the look-out for deer, because my dog loses every shred of intelligence when he sees a deer, and the chase is on.  And this time of year, I’ve seen little spotted-fawns scamper out of the woods, right into our back yard --- then stand there, dumbfounded, “where am I?”  It would have a short life if my dog saw it first.

I’m scanning the woods and I see something that doesn’t belong: this thing looks like a remnant of somebody’s dark brown shag carpet hanging in a high branch of a tree. But we haven’t had any high winds to leave debris in a tree, so I ran and got the binoculars out of the truck.  Turns out, it’s a swarm of bees!

I hollered for Rich to stop and showed him the bees in a tree that he had just mowed under. Bees are supposed to be real sensitive to loud noises, like lawn mowers. I came in the house and did a quick internet search on bee swarms and found out that they're not that aggressive when they swarm. They're just out searching for a new place for their queen to set up her royal nursery.  So I got my camera and took some pictures.

A little later we came in the house for a break.  When we went back out, the bees were gone --- moved on. In the 25 years we’ve lived here, I’ve only seen a swarm of bees once, and it was just passing over.

A swarm of bees in May is worth a load of hay;

A swarm of bees in June is worth a silver spoon;

A swarm of bees in July, let them fly.

  ~old English rhyme