wrong hive ...

   With all the time we've been in the Winnie, we've never come up with a name for her. We thought about "La Concha de Tortuga"  (The Turtle Shell) .. but that didn't stick ... Lately we've been calling her The Hive : ) The place always smells of sweet beeswax (so much that we have a dozen or so bees drop in through the little skylights together). And you know we eat a LOT of honey!

   We love when the bees grace us with their presence, but we always make sure to usher them out before the dinner bell rings back at their hive. Interestingly enough, bees and the hive are considered one organism. They can fly up to ten miles to collect nectar, but if they don't return to the hive each day, they're almost certain to die of dehydration and exhaustion, so we're very serious about making sure they don't get trapped in our hive.

  But sometimes ...

 

   This morning, after a late night of candle making, I dropped down the ladder and out of the crow's nest, and as I stumbled across to the bathroom, what do I find but these three little girls. They weren't moving at all, just hanging to the sheer white curtain no doubt exhausted. 

    So we mixed up a powerful cocktail to get their little blood sugar up : ) 

    We made sure they all had their own spoon because we know from experience that these little girls don't like the idea of sharing a drink ...

 
    They picked up the scent real quick ; )

  

 And boy-oh-boy were they hungry.

 

Pace yourselves, ladies ... pace yourselves : )

   And just like that, a little raw wildflower honey and off they went through the skylights, back to the hive to buzz another day. 

  A few interesting facts about honey bees:

  -Bees can fly up to 15 miles per hour. 

  

  -Bees visit 1000 plus flowers in a single day.

  

  -Honey never ever goes bad. 

  

  -A bee's lifespan is just over 30 days. (the Queen can live 3-5 years)

  

  -Bees have to visit about 2 million flowers collectively to make one lb of honey.

  -Bees are the only insect to produce food for humans. 

  

  -The Queen Bee can lay up to 2000 eggs per day. 

  

  -Bees eat about 8 pounds of honey to produce just one pound of beeswax.

  

  -Bees regulate the hive temperature at right around 95 degrees.

  

  -Bees have two stomachs - one to fill with nectar to feed their body and a second one to carry nectar back to the hive to be made into honey.   

  

  -Bees have five eyes. 

  

  -Worker bees make about 1/ 12th of a teaspoon of honey in their whole life.

  -A single hive can make about 100 pounds of extra honey (makes you think twice about finally putting in that garden kit beehive : )

   

  -A beehive in the summer can have up to 80,000 bees inside.