Solitude
Bee-eautiful Bluebells
Seeing the Future in a Flowering Currant
Welcome Back Bumbles
Bee Memories
Here’s a lovely little bee for you from a week or two back, before the weather turned wet and blustery.
Remember the bees? They swarmed in our house, which was a tad unfortunate, and then set up home in the soffits of our roof. We grew quite fond of them after a while as they didn’t bother us once they were settled.
Sadly their nest has since been overtaken by wasps which insist on coming into our bathroom on a daily basis! We’ve had to resort to insect-killing spray 😦 Hopefully soon the weather will get too cold for them and we have read that they rarely return to old nests. Fingers tightly crossed that’s true – I’m so sick of having to warily enter my bathroom incase there is a wasp buzzing around in there.
I remember our bees with fondness … much preferable to wasps!
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Bee Tease
At my mum’s the other day I was watching Bumblebees busy collecting nectar on Teasels. They are very methodical, going round and round the teasel visiting every little flower. It seems like a dull, repetitive job, but they do it with apparent enthusiasm. I think I could do with a bit of their attitude to the dull jobs like cleaning and tidying! I am tempted to get teasels in our garden too as they are great for the bees, and also look so impressive and sculptural right through the year.
squatters
Sometimes when I think about the bees I get a twinge in my foot, right where I was stung. It twinged when I heard they’d come back, along with a shudder of fear right down my spine. Because that day, that day was the stuff of nightmares. Bees everywhere, a sting, and no sleep all. But they live with us now. We co-habit. We have the house. They have the soffits. I didn’t even know what a soffit was until they decided to live in it. Funny word, soffit. So there they are, unmovable, squatting in the soffit, and really, as it turns out, they’re not so bad. I still shower with the window open, bringing the countryside in despite their proximity in their soffit home. And sometime soon, when I think of the bees it will be with a smile not a twinge.
gone
in the absence
of bees
there is air in my lungs
and calm in my soul
and the pain of the sting
is fast fading
in the absence
of bees
comes the easing of fear
and my mind can let go
into sleep
The Bees
I am fond of bees. Correction, I was fond of bees. I like bees outside on plants and buzzing happily. I like taking photos of them about their business. I do not like them in my house, gathering in the windows and setting up home in my loft. I especially do not like them underfoot. I had never been stung before. I was a bee-sting virgin. Just that one false step and my foot descended on a sleepy bee resting on the carpet. The viscious pain caught me completely by surprise. For an instant I thought I’d simply stood on something sharp, but then it dawned as the pain spasmed through my instep. A bee. One little bee that I had failed to carefully and oh-so-gently remove from my house. A moment of sheer panic – it hurts it hurts it hurts – what do I do now? On hand a loved one with a phone to google … should I pull it out!? Yes yes yes! And then the waiting, will I react, will it stop hurting, what is going to happen? Fortunately not a lot. A lingering achey soreness, but no real damage. Apart from to my mental health … a night spent sleeplessly, anxious about bees underfoot, anxious about the possibility of a bee lingering in my daughter’s bed, her carpet, her slippers … And now I sit afar, lunch-breaking, and hoping that the news of the bees departure is the end of the story. No re-runs please.
evening in the garden
purple flower spikes
less busy now
as evening comes
and here I sit
with tea
and camera
(just in case)
no butterflies left
they’ve gone to bed
(where do they sleep?)
but still the swallows
chitter by
the out-late bees
hum-bumble low
and early moths
flutter
time slows
to a honeyed trickle
in our wild garden
Bees Wings
The other day when I was chasing bees around the Hebe, I started trying to catch them in flight. This was a bit of a mad idea as it was hard enough to get a shot when they stopped for a second on the flowers. However, I persisted, and though none of the shots are exactly what I was aiming for, they are at least quite interesting… I think I’d have to up the shutter speed a fair bit more to capture their wings better, but that means opening up the aperture as wide as can be or there’s not enough light … more experiments to come I’m sure.
buzzing blues
one day buzzing of bees in the sunshine
next day buzzing of blues in my ears
bluebells lose their bells and become merely blues
and the hues are fading grey-wards
with the rain clouds
