AncienTrails

Beltane                                                                      Planting Moon

On a cold, snowy day not long ago I hived a 2 pound package of Italian hygienics.  My back hurt, I was clumsy.  The queen squeezed out of her cage, around the marshmallow, requiring me to shut the hive box up more quickly than I would have liked.  A few bees remained in the package and I couldn’t get them into the hive.

The cork went into the hole, the cover back on the hive box and I went back inside convinced I had failed in the hiving.  This last three weeks or so has not been a happy time for me with the severe back pain, Kona’s medical issues and Kate’s absence during that time, so I was predisposed to doubt myself.

Yet.  Today I went out, on a sunny day, bright with the hope peculiar to spring, clothed in my bee suit, smoker and hive tool to hand, and lifted the cover.  Checking for brood.  Brood means the colony is queenright, the queen accepted by the colony and laying eggs.  Brood means honey once the blossoms begin to multiply and the nectar flow becomes substantial.

And there they were.  Hexagonal cells capped with the distinctive brown covering the bees use to incubate their future allies in the maintenance of the colony.  The buzzing of the hive when I lifted the lid made me sure I would find brood.  This was a living thing, vital and strong.  The noise alone made that clear.  Still, I had to find the brood cells and I did.

I’m glad, too.  There were days over the last couple of weeks when I hoped that the queen had flown and the whole mess of beekeeping would recede into the past.  Now though with the weather and my mood lifting I wanted the brood to be there, to continue this ancient practice.  And it was and I will.