7/9/2013 - Bees STINK

I went over to open up the guest center Sunday at noon and when I checked the bee hive that is inside with viewable windows I saw a bunch of dead bees at the bottom.

There is a tube that goes out the bottom and goes outside so that they can get in and out.  As bees in the hive die the worker bees take them out and drop them in a tube that gets cleaned out everyday.  Well, the tube going out of the hive got plugged up with dead bees and they could not get in or out.  I called our biologist, Carloline, and she came over.  There is a small opening in the bottom that she was able to get a wire in and start dragging the dead ones out.  Dead bees stink.  She drug several hundred out.  She was unable to get the tube unplugged so we called the bee guy, Al.

Al and Caroline worked on it for over three hours and decided they would start over on Monday. 

I had to go to St. Joseph yesterday to get some work done on my tattoos and Linda said they worked on it all day.  They finally had to take it apart and totally open it up to get it cleaned out.  There are about half the amount of bees in it this morning.  On Sunday Al had told me that when they started the hive the queen was laying around 1500 eggs a day and that cycle was starting to die off at the rate of 1000 a day.  He said this is normal and that she is constantly laying eggs.  That is her function in life.  I can't tell if she is pregnant or not.  That's a joke folks (barefoot and pregnant).

All in all, the hive looks like it is functioning as it should be now.  Time will tell.

Chris, my tattoo guy that owns Click Me The Flying Pig Tattoo Parlor in St. Joseph did some major highlighting around my current tattoos getting my sleeve ready.  Hopefully before we leave the area he will be able to put my last two grandsons on (Bryce and Tyler) with a baseball between their names. 

My arm is pretty irritated right now, but, when it calms down I will get some pictures taken.

That's it for now.