What a Difference a Year Makes

Greetings from lovely Florida where we are with my entire family – a huge reunion to send my mother off on her next journey. Thank you for the support and kind words that you have sent us. While we are sad that mom is no longer here with us, we are happy that she had a peaceful home-going and that she no longer has to worry about aches and pains. In her honor, I want to write about two things – a recent interest (bees) and a lifelong love (flowers).

Mom loved hearing how we and the bees were doing each time I talked with her or when we visited. She would ask how what Mark was doing with them and if they were making honey. Last year, we talked about how hard it was for them to survive during the drought and how hard it was for the flowers to survive as well. This year, we visited her a couple of times and we were able to tell her that things looked better with the rains we received over the winter months and then also into spring. I wish I could have shown her our wildflowers because she would have loved the colors out here. My mom could make any plant robust, even if I had taken it to the point of death. 🙂 She was AMAZING! She would have loved the Horsemint from this season, which was abundant and fragrant, too.

Here’s a shot to remind you what the Horsemint from 2011 looked like with so little rain. See how brown it was? See how brown the background was as well?

In the picture at the beginning of this post, did you notice the bees with yellow pollen on their backs? They get that from the horsemint because of the way the flower is shaped. As you watch them work the Horsemint, you can see how their backs rub up against the flower in a way that gets pollen all over them. Here’s a closeup of some of them –

And here is a shot of one of the girls working the Horsemint –

Amazing what a year makes. Here’s to you mom. You’re gone in body but you’ll always, always, always be in our hearts. We love you and we know you’re now going to be able to visit all our bee yards with us. 🙂

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Horsemint in Bloom

Horsemint is also sometimes called beebalm I learned and now it’s starting to bloom in our area. It’s such a lovely flower and we’ve seen white and purple in the past, although last year we saw next to nothing of it due to the drought and heat. This year looks like it will be much better as we saw plenty of the white ones in the fields and along the country roads we were cruising tonight. The bees love horsemint and it’ll make great tasting honey I’m sure. I shot these at the bee yard at My Father’s Farm as Mark was checking on that seventh swarm he just posted about – guess what? They are ALL GONE! Not a single one in the hive. Weird. It confirmed for Mark his hunch that they were Africanized. Well, I hope they are happy wherever they land and that they don’t bother anybody.

In bloom at My Father's Farm bee yard

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