LONG LIVE THE QUEEN

QUEEN FOUND

MYSTERY SOLVED

     As you may recall when last we left our bee hive there

was concern that no Queen was in residence.  The colony appeared healthy and vibrant, but no queen even though there was evidence that larvae might be present.  "Odd" is how bee expert and advisor, Ian left things, "really odd."

     Well, Ian and his mentor, 30 year bee keeper Michael, paid a visit to look things over.  They even brought a Queen, in the carrier below.

   Michael confirmed Ian's assessment, there indeed had been a Queen's cell, now abandoned.  It is now useless.

    As they continued to study the hive, they saw more signs of a Queenly presence, but not until they were well into the 

hive did they make the great discovery.  

   There was Queenie-a nice sized and young queen. She is the large bee in the center of the frame.  Though partially covered by wings, you can see she is larger than the others.

   She is the large bee, again just below the middle of the frame. She is also more blond. 

  She's in the same relative location in both of the remaining frames.  

  Ian and Michael say she is "a good looking queen."   Further inspection found more evidence of larvae, so the colony should be fine.  But there is a fascinating back story.

  They speculate this hive just recently, in the last day or two, made this queen. On first inspection we could not find her, because she is brand new, just born.  

   One of two things probably happened, the old queen either died, or quit producing off spring and was killed, so a new fertile Queen could take over. Both experts say it is better for a hive to produce its own Queen rather than bring one in from the outside. That is true to a point.  After 3 or 4 generations, apparently the DNA or gene pool can be over drawn and you can begin to experience problems.  More Bee drama in that case.   

   As the distant observer, I'm waiting for this hive of Blond Italians  to start making enough honey that their documentarian can share the sweet goody.  

   BTW, I'm told they are a different group from our original Blond Italians who simply disappeared. They either were weakened from with in and were overpowered by marauders or simply swarmed away, for any number of reasons.  Who knew the Bees were so much like human Royalty.  Intrigue, inbreeding, palace coups, roaming bandits.

    The drama buzzes here on the ridge.

    See you down the trail. 
    HERE IS A LATE POST SCRIPT-NOTICE THE COMMENT BELOW FROM MICHAEL, WITH SOME CLARIFICATIONS.

THE BEE MYSTERY

WHAT'S WITH THE HIVE?

      Regular readers of Light/Breezes may recall earlier postings about our hive of Blond Italian Bees from Glenn California.  These are the same gentle bees that suddenly disappeared after apparently being attacked by interlopers. 
      All at once we had an empty hive, our Blond Italians no where to be found.  We waited a while, but the hive remained quiet.  Lana was tipped by George, a northern California bee keeper to put out a little lemon grass oil to see if it would attract a swarm.  It did indeed, some of these guys are included in that number.

    We asked Ian, a local bee keeper and expert to take a look at our new swarm and to check out conditions in our re-located hive.

     Ian found a full and productive hive. Evidence of honey being made, but mysteriously no sign of a queen.  He found
the beginnings of a queen's "condo", but no sign of a queen.

 In his Kiwi accent, he noted a couple of times that it was
"odd."  So now the mystery has taken another turn, an odd turn.  A busy and seemingly productive hive without a queen in command. What does that mean?  Stay tuned.

See you down the trail.

THE WEEKENDER :) ENJOY THE GAMES

IT'S ONLY EVERY FOUR YEARS

     Late the other night, or early one morning as it was, I headed off to bed, wondering why I had stayed so late at the party, watching BMX racing.  I don't usually watch BMX racing, but this was of the Olympic variety, and well, a gold medal was on the line.  And it was fascinating, maybe because of the newness.

     The Olympics do this sort of thing to me.  Maybe it is the pre-event hype and background, but I get kind of addicted to the games.  I find myself suddenly in possession of knowledge about lives and histories of athletes that a few weeks ago I didn't know existed. 

     I do marvel at the talent, skill and power of the competitors.  I'm particularly keen on track, since that was my best high school sport. I was even captain of the team, but when I see how quickly Husain Bolt covered the 100 and compare it to my best speed and wonder if we were on the track at the same time, well, the best I can say is that we started at the same time.  
     Anyway, we head into the last weekend of the extravaganza and I leave you with a sport and young sportsman that you'll likely never see on an Olympic medal stand, but I suspect you'll find this amazing.  It's all in the spirit of the Weekender :).  Have fun with this.

See you down the trail.

WHAT ARE YOU GONNA DO?

FEELING THEIR PAIN

     From what some of them are saying, the skies are less 
than blue for Young Republicans.  I've read a few pieces over the last week that hint some of the junior members of the GOP are doing what their moderate seniors have been unable to do, put some distance between them and the far right tea party mind set that has taken over the steering wheel of the Republican party.

     Many of the young politicians have different views on social issues and believe the party elders have acquiesced or become strident.  In an article written by Susan Saluny of the New York Times a young GOP member is quoted as saying "when it comes to what you do in your bedroom, or where you go to church or where you put your tattoo, we just couldn't care less."

      I have long time friends in both major parties as well as long time relationships with political operatives on both sides.  Democrats are delighted that fewer young Americans want to associate with the Republican party.  A Republican friend says it is no wonder when the current crop of house and senate republicans have become so ideologically "narrow" (his word).  

      Women's health and rights has become a huge dividing line for young women. Young Americans, according to polls, are more accepting of gay rights and same sex marriage. Any organization that seems to balk at, contend or challenge on those issues stands to loose millennials as well.

       It's a bit like the old Kermit song..."It hard to be green"

or a young republican.  As a long time political junkie it is

weird to see sitting republicans bad mouth policies that were once put forward by "radicals" like Bob Dole, Richard Nixon, George H.W. Bush, and even the old Gipper.

    DAY FILE

COOL SCENES

HERE'S AN EXERCISE IN PATIENCE

SUN SET TO FULL MOON RISE

See you down the trail.

NORAH JONES & PLUM CRAZY

NORAH ROCKED

     Norah Jones, under the stars, at the Santa Barbara Bowl was a kind of celestial event of its own.  

      She is an extraordinary singer, with a unique blend of power, earthiness, mellow soul and plaintive phrasing. On this tour she is backed by a band of exquisite players who can easily slide from driving rock, bluesy funk and beyond. There were moments when the band wandered into a kind of exploratory atmosphere of high energy improvisation, where Norah's rich voice was the grounding and tether that made it work. It was, to my amateur ears, contrapuntal.  This is a different Norah than some of her earlier, softer work, but it is thrilling and superb.

      Cory Chisel and the Wandering Sons who opened were a special treat with a country and folk lilt. He's a great lyricist and I hope we see and hear more from him.

      A quick observation-too many people seem increasingly self absorbed and rude.  There were entirely too many people texting during the concert and too many of the crowd from the upfront and center seats thought nothing of entering, after Norah had begun.  Rude behavior on both counts!    

     The drive down the coast and back was vacation land beautiful and stunning. 

DAY FILE

PLUM CRAZY

     Local Plums, growing wild, have yielded a beautiful bounty.  They will be eaten fresh, dehydrated, or cooked into jam.

See you down the trail.

WE ARE ALL STAKE HOLDERS

SOME THINGS HAVE TO BE SAID

     Despite my intention to provide only art and beauty in this first post of the week perhaps an obvious statement needs to be made.

      How many Americans need to be gunned down before citizens demand that something be done?  No other nation on the planet has as many murders. I am a full supporter of the Bill of Rights.  The first amendment is my favorite, but all of them are important.  So I'm not trashing the Second. Still something is profoundly wrong when deranged people or hate filled bigots and zealots can so easily destroy life.

       We cannot continue to take these shocks and refuse to do something to prevent them.  We all have a stake in this.

DAY FILE

LINES AND TEXTURES
a collection of scenes where I was struck
by linearity and patterns

In the shot above and below is a pattern of lines in confluence.

   Kelp, seaweed trailing on the surface of the water.

   These are shots of light captured on ripples in the Pacific

   Lines of an emerging lean to

FOR CLASSICAL MUSIC LOVERS ONLY
A CAMBRIA LOCAL

   Camp Ocean Pines, which is very true to its name, hosted

an extraordinary musical event this weekend.  Under the towering Monterey Pine, with window peaks of the deep Pacific Blue warmed by dappled sun beneath the arch of cobalt blue skies, musicians filled the air with classical beauty.  Performers had completed the Summer Strings Workshop under the guidance of the San Luis Obispo Symphony.  Here is a sample.  My apologies the video quality is not more fitting the quality of the music. We gleaned this with a hand held iPhone.  Still, you'll get a sense of the special afternoon.

THE WEEKENDER :) AWESOME

AWESOME!
in so many ways

     The Weekender :) begins with a tribute to patience.

8 hours of Wednesday and Thursday were spent on the phone and on line sorting through nooks and crannies of my computer and programs looking for the reason I could not effectively use some of the tool bar on this blogger site.

     Dan from Apple support was the guy who was on the phone as we finally jiggled a jot that got it done.  Richard was helpful for two hours of searching.  Before that Brian was helpful, if perplexed before handing me over to a guy in iphoto support. He was a bit testy and slightly arrogant though he was dealing with me and my frustration and I could well have been the source of his seeming irritation.  Except for that the Apple guys were truly helpful, attentive and superb.

      Blogger support is merely canned text or direction to "support groups" that in reality are a list of people with questions and complaints that go largely unattended by anyone with Blogger.

       The source of the sudden chaos in my peaceful cyber world was updating the mac to Safari 6.  Things are different in Safari 6 and some of those things are little goblins that have disruptive capacity.  So, I'm singing the praises of the Awesome Apple Support team and my own Mac's Only Guru, Rick who was able to plow into some helpful and suggestive space very quickly.  Though this Blogger world is big, rich and full of great stuff, they could take a few lessons from the Apple team.

       And I can't help but think about trying to explain to my late mom and dad some of the stuff their eldest was doing with, in and around a computer, while on the phone, and on line. That would have been both amusing and Awesome!  My daughters would probably land more on Amusing!

                                   NOW THIS IS 

                                TRULY AWESOME

     Thanks to my friend and retired Navy man Lew for this find. Please take 5 minutes sometime this weekend to see this extraordinary bit of life on this blue planet.

                                              

DAY FILE

OF SEEDS AND BEES
for the land bound

      It's the time of year when we like to collect lupine seed as the pods turn brown.  But, as you notice, one must collect carefully.

Take a look around this weekend
and find something awesome in your world.
See you down the trail.