Newbees and oldies

I spent another morning at Five Rivers, as the instructor training continued.  Today we learned a lot about bees.

There has long been a beehive on one of the trails, which is used to teach people (especially kids) about the life and work of honey bees.  Unfortunately this winter the bees all died for whatever reason (could have been the harsh conditions, or disease, or a mishap befalling the queen).  Staff are therefore taking the opportunity to clean up and repair the beehive, and invest in an additional one to be placed in the orchard.  New bees should be arriving in a few weeks, and fingers crossed they will like hanging out and doing their busy bee thing at Five Rivers. Until that time we'll be allowing visiting school groups to see inside the hive, which I think they will enjoy.

Though I won't go into it here, the way bees organize themselves is pretty fascinating and worth reading up about if you are at all inclined.

Gimlet update:  I picked my new one up from the local store.  It is labelled as a "screw starter", but apparently an older colleague of the young chaps at the store saw it and said fondly, "Ah! A gimlet!"  So that places me, then.