Just some of the "birds and the bees" in our backyard :)
We're having so much fun with the birds in our yard. Some of them even seem to be getting used to us...but, maybe that's just in my head.
The hole in the tree must hold water because birds are constantly going up there and dipping their heads in.
Chad checked the bees out today. It was our first time really getting into the hives since the fall. It was so exciting. We thought for sure we wouldn't have strong hives because we've moved them twice and we got hive beetles over the summer. Fortunately, one way you can try to get rid of hive beetles is by moving your hives to a new location. IT must have worked! Both hives seemed very healthy and there were way more bees than we expected. There was a new queen in one of the hives. When we bought our queen we bought them marked and the queen we found looked young and was not marked. We couldn't find the queen in the other hive. There were lots of larvae. We are still learning, but, we've been pleasantly surprised with our first year of beekeeping. It hasn't been that much work and we've only experienced a few stings. We are looking forward to getting some of our own honey this year!
The queen is the one in the middle with the noticeably larger abdomen. You can see the larvae in the cells. They are being fed by the worker bees.
