As It Should Be

Tom and Liz and me go down to the bees.  We have big plans.  But as in all things to do with beekeeping, they don't quite pan out.  

The plan was to Early Shook Swarm all three hives, replacing Tom's colonies in his new equipment, and putting my hive back into my clean, original old equipment.  Except that my colony is so huge we decided to use some of the brood to build up Tom's hives to full fighting strength before we do Shook Swarms on his.  And so all of Tom's brand new equipment ended up surrounding my bees, with new frames and foundation, and some food.  It's only temporary, till next week, but it did all feel a bit back to front!

There were a few frames of brood left, and it was Tom and Liz's clever idea not to let these go to waste, but to feed them to the chickens.  We lay the frames around on the green grass and let the chickens start to nibble on the honeycomb, dipping in to find juicy fresh larvae.  We began to scrape and clean my old equipment.   Then Tom's heat gun ran out of gas.  So we shrugged, and sweated off the beesuits and sat in the cool fresh afternoon under the magnolia tree and drank tea.

As the afternoon got warmer, the baby bees in the frames on the lawn began to birth.  It was quite heartbreaking to see all those new baby bees come out ... to a hostile environment that was not home in the hive .. destined to die.  I ran back to the hive trying to save some, but really - a silly, bleeding heart gesture.  The chickens will eat them.  And so they should.  

As I left, Tom and Liz gave me a six-pack of eggs.  And it occurred to me this morning, as I chomped through a deliciously soft-boiled egg, that this is the way things should be.  We work the bees, and harvest their honey.  We take the frames of brood that must be disposed of and feed them to the chickens.  And the chickens give us eggs, and we eat them, and gain energy to go back once more to the beehives.  

It makes such perfect sense to me.  In the summer we'll eat the apples off the trees, and we'll harvest apricots for the jam.  And the sun and heat will warm our bees and make honey, and all the local forage will build our immune systems and make us feel well, and then winter will come back again to allow everything to rest and regenerate once more next year.

How could things be any other way?  

I am so grateful to have experienced this natural process, and to be a part of it.  It makes me feel healthy and whole again.

It is all as it should be.