bees

It was no ordinary road trip. Usually the ride to the Delta and back is pretty straightforward -- 400 miles, maybe one stop, several Diet Cokes and a brown dog in the back seat. Yesterday, all of that was again the case, but with a few thousand additional passengers -- honey bees.

My Dad added beekeeping to his many and varied list of hobbies last year (with delicious results), but I’m not sure when exactly I got sucked in. Perhaps it was the notion that a beehive would somehow bolster my garden production, or that it was something else good and tangible I could do for the environment, or maybe it was just thinking it was really cool and interesting.

Whatever the draw, all of those positive notions were the furthest things from my mind when I loaded my 60,000 new friends with stingers into the back of my Celica. (Oh, the random things that have fit in the back of my car over the years -- Christmas trees, Adirondack chairs, large TVs, eight-foot garden trellises, three bales of hay, and now, beehives.)

During our travels back and forth to our beekeeping class, Dad had assured me the transport wouldn’t be a problem, and I mostly agreed. It would only be two hive boxes with bees, and they would have a screen on one side and a cover on the other. What could possibly go wrong?

The bee hives in the trunk of my car.

When loading time arrived, we donned our bee suits, dusted off the renegade bees clinging on the outside of the screens and put the two boxes in the car. I piled my luggage in the front, while Mazzy squeezed in beside additional empty hive boxes in the back, and we were off.

I heard nothing but the radio the first forty miles or so, then there was a buzz. I could see the little bugger in my rear view mirror, banging against the back glass like a prisoner in a cell. Zzzz zzzz zzzz. It only took a few buzzes before I pulled over and quickly put on the long beekeeping gloves in the seat beside me. I needed to both silence the renegade bee and see how many others were loose in the trunk. Problem one was remedied quickly, with a splat, but inside the back hatch I discovered my bigger challenge -- a dozen or so bees crawling around on the *outside* of the tightly sealed hives. (How they got free, we still have no idea.)

With cars and 18-wheelers zooming by on the highway, there was no time to linger. I would just have to hope they stayed put and get back on the road. Twenty minutes passed before I heard that ominous sound again, this time in stereo. Three little bees were buzzing in my back window this time! Zzzzz zzzz zzzz zzz zzzzzz zzzz

Blinker, brakes, gloves on, out of the car I went -- this time followed by the dog. Five more times over the next hour and half, I pulled over and went through the same drill, all the while knowing that once I reached the busy interstate, pulling over constantly would be dangerous, and at this pace, I would never get home and would certainly get stung.

The hive all set up in the backyard.

By the eighth stop, though, I had a plan. I exited at a shopping center, went in and bought two bed sheets, which I stuffed in every possible opening around the back flap covering my trunk. Cautiously optimistic, I resumed the road trip, set my cruise faster than normal and didn’t stop again until I reached my driveway.

When I finally unlatched them in their new spot in the corner of my backyard, I’m not sure who was more relieved -- me or the bees. And they’ve been buzzing around ever since, seeming to stick close to the hive, as if asking each other where the heck they are.

But with the flowers and gardens throughout the neighborhood beckoning, I’m sure they’ll soon settle in to their new city home -- plus, they kinda have to, because I’m certainly not putting them back in my car again anytime soon.

The bees new "city" home -- my backyard!

A shot from beekeeping class. It was quite an eclectic mix of people and *lots* of bees!

This post is dedicated to my Dad, who has inspired me to do many things in my life, among them now is keeping honey bees buzzing for the benefit of us all. And to my fabulous Cowgirl, who aptly and encouragingly observed that spring is my creative season. I hibernated from blogging and much else over the winter and hope to return with renewed and buzzing fervor in the months ahead.