More about bees...

My dad is a beekeeper (among the many other hobbies he has). He has had honey bees since before I was born. Recently he has started rescuing bee swarms from people's homes - that would otherwise be killed by a terminator. Honey bees are actually becoming a little scarce and a law was recently passed making it unlawful to kill a honey bee.

Yes, the female honey bees (regular looking bees) sting, the male bees (drones that are a bit darker than the females) do not, and the queen bees (longer body that looks like the females) rarely do, but can. Sometimes, there are some rather mean and aggressive bees - these could be related to the African bees and should be killed (law or no law).

Eating the local honey from the local pollen around you is the best way to keep yourself rid of allergies. There are all sorts of ways to rob the hive (get the honey) - one that I prefer is to be wrapped from head to toe in a thick suit, gloves that come up to my elbow, and net bee hat. A smoker can be used to blow smoke on the bees that make them fat and hard for them to sting. My dad on the other hand can walk up to a hive, lift the top box, pop out a frame and grab some honey comb. He doesn't mind being stung - bee stings are actually really really good for your circulation and joints. The bee stings are actually being used to help MS patients! I have yet to purposely sting myself like my parents do!

My dad has a certain way to attract local bees (with a cone type bee catcher with a queen bee) for a backyard hive. We are currently working on his web site and hopefully have it done soon for all the other beehive hopefuls out there! I hope to have the hive in the backyard once the yard is complete...I don't want to scare off my husband from completing the yard with a bunch of bees flying around. Oh another tip...point the opening of the bee hive up against a fence, so they will go up and over the fence (and bee the neighbors problem)! : )

Not much...but something

So, although I have vowed not to do anything to the front or back yard until the stairs inside the house are done (they are not even started yet), I have taken some of Janet's advice from her post and decided everything didn't have to be perfect for me to do something...although I didn't have my truck full of top soil or mulch ready, nor even a shovel handy...I decided, as I sat in our front yard throwing the ball for our two dogs (Kady-Golden Retriever and Mason-Dachshund), to go ahead and make one of my flower beds bigger...I just used my hands and took away the grass and then moved the rock around a bit in preparation to bring more rocks to line the bed (we have piles and piles of white limestone rock either left over from building our house 25 years ago or they just come up out of the ground?). I plan to do another matching bed on the other side of the sidewalk hopefully today as I throw the ball for Kady and Mason again (our daily ritual).

I am also desperately trying to find the "before" photos of our back yard and suspect they are on an unlabeled cd mixed within a stack of cd's.

I do plan to take pictures of our retaining walls, picket fence, and patio that we have done so far...alas nothing planted as of yet. I have to say, it is a bit difficult revealing the "coming along" stages...I am such a "big reveal" type person.

Stairs, stairs, stairs!