Honey Bees

I Have a stand of Anise(lavender) Hyssops out in my wild garden. Today, it is covered in bees. Their little leg pouches are puffed out with yellow pollen. I can hear a steady hum from them and it struck me that Years ago it was pretty common to find a bunch of honey bees working a tree or patch of wild flowers. Not so much these days.
It's a soothing sort of sound.
I have never kept a hive of bees but have always been interested in them. I even subscribed to the American bee journal many years ago.
At present, the bees are working in the hyssops, purple cone flower and culvers roots. The hyssops are a bi-annual and bloom the first year from seed. They grow on most soils and can stand some pretty dry dirt. One plant produces a bunch of flowering stalks. The seed is cheap. I would recommend it to folks who keep bees.


https://www.prairienursery.com/store/seeds/lavender-hyssop-seed-agastache-foeniculum#.XURsEehKhPY

Around here, in Pa, there’s not much nectar available for the next 3-4 weeks. The plants you mentioned, along with Joe Pie weed, and the remenants of white clover. Everything changes once the goldenrod comes on. Then it’s game on.

We still have a couple thistles in bloom. That makes excellent honey.

we weren't able to buy any nucs around here! called all of the suppliers and they all had NONE

I looked at several of my hives today seeing if they were bringing in anything on their legs. They were. Lots! Some bees had orange colored and some red.
I’ve got a couple of nasty bee hives. I looked at my mild bees from a couple feet away. I was about ten feet away from the Vikings and got popped on the shoulder.
I have broken the Vikings down in nuc boxes and requeened them. They killed all the queens but one. So I’m going to let them requeen their selves. Mean biotches.

I found a swarm in the tubing of my boat hitch the other day. At night, there was a huge ball of them at ball end of hitch. During the day, a lot of them would be foraging. Wife had a friend from work that tends bees to come and capture all they could. They were really excited. I was wondering if they were wild bees that came here or if they left from someone elses hive.