Fuss

I thought beekeeping photos were done for the year, but this is such fun I could not resist. The briefest of visits to give them a bit of winter-proofing, as the weather turns its face from summer to winter, which is exactly what happened today. First, an old pillow between the ceiling and the roof, to help them retain as much heat as possible, and reduce the effort they need to put into generating it. Second, a slide-in piece of hardboard underneath the hive floor, not sealing it completely, but reducing the risk of winter winds blowing up through the open, wire-mesh floor and chilling the colony

The car thermometer said 7.5C. Bright sunlight, as you see but, at that temperature, only a couple of them were tentatively exploring outside the entrance. However, by the time I had taken the roof off and rattled about above them, knocked and clattered underneath them inserting the board, and briefly lifted one side of the hive a millimeter or two to check that it is reassuringly heavy (i.e. full of winter food stores) - probably rocking their frames around, they were sufficiently exasperated to come pouring out in numbers to let it be known they would appreciate being left alone

At 7.5 degrees, though, they are pretty torpid and sleepy. They gave the impression that, once they realised it was 'only us', they shrugged their shoulders and just grumbled among themselves. One or two took to the wing. If you zoom in to the centre of the picture, you can see that one result was a hilarious mid-air collision. Stay zoomed and the brilliant sun makes the backlight on the bee at the top left look like a mini Vermeer painting. The shadows of the flying bees on the timber, the the lucky focus on them, give a 3D effect that I find quite convincing - a bit like the old 'Viewmaster' toy images

We did leave them to their quiet sunny corner. By mid-day, clouds obscured the sun. By 3pm, a cold rain was falling. I hope they have come to see that there was method in the madness of our intrusion