The Nature Photography Thread

[Sid]

Very nice pictures, Sid.

Thanks Stefan. From you thats a real compliment.

Some did come out pretty good. Some were 50 to 100 yards away, so I'm not too disappointed with the quality.

Sid

[drache]

saw a beelike insect in the park

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1249/...bcd40f5a_b.jpg

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1323/...4892f04e_b.jpg

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1193/...92399507_b.jpg

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1333/...4c80ebb1_b.jpg

[stonyloam]

Just a plane old (the wings are kind of frazzled) honey bee (apis mellifera) sucking on a white clover blossom (trifolium repens) of four leaf clover fame. Nice photos, looks like you have gotten the hang of the digital thing.

[KITKAT]

Except these days, with the beekeepers having trouble with colony crash, the plain ole honeybee is getting harder to find outdoors these days!

An interesting fact... the (few) people who have ORGANIC fields full of flowering plants to feed their bees are not suffering colony crash.

[stonyloam]

KK: Rhea sure has it right “.. one damn thing after another”. My poor bees are totally stressed out with mites and hard winters and now a dry summer. I am down to 1 hive from 3. Hoping to get a queen and make a split to get at least back to 2. Love to watch them, unless they are po’d.

[Stefan-A]

Good photos, Rhea.



"It's not true that life is one damn thing after another--it's one damned thing over and over."
~Edna St. Vincent Millay

[drache]

"It's not true that life is one damn thing after another--it's one damned thing over and over."
~Edna St. Vincent Millay

in my case it's every damn thing all at once

but the park is full of these little honeybees enjoying the clover
I hope yours recover and multiply, Terry
how often do they make new queens?

[stonyloam]

Queens can live a couple of years, but usually when the colony gets to a certain size the queen along with about ½ of the workers will leave (swarm) to try to establish a new colony some distance away. Before they do that they will make some new queens that hatch after the old queen leaves. This leaves the established colony with a new strong queen to carry on. I may take a look inside today, if I do I’ll try to get some pix.

[stonyloam]

Rhea seemed interested in some bee stuff, so I took my camera with me when I dug into my hive this afternoon. I smoked them up good and dove in. It looked pretty good in the top hive body found lots of capped brood. Young bees getting ready to hatch. Nice solid pattern indicates a good queen.




Found three just in the process of chewing their way out.



This is the larva before it is capped. There are all stages here from eggs (just above the bee) to one in the center bottom that is just starting to be capped. There is a story about one beginner beekeeper that made a frantic call to the county bee examiner because he opened up his hive and it was full of maggots. Don’t know if it’s true but it is a good story lol. The liquid in the cells is honey with just a little royal jelly for food.



At last what I was looking for … A queen cell. They are a lot bigger to allow the young queen to grow. She is a worker that is fed royal jelly to allow her to develop sexually. This one is empty so they have not reached the trigger population for swarming yet. Will have to keep an eye on them.




Didn’t find the queen, but eggs show she is healthy. Only got stung once, my fault pinched one. Always feel bad about killing one. I hope you find this at least mildly interesting.

[Stefan-A]

Very nice close-ups, Terry. And indeed interesting.