Stung

This is a busy time of year in the apiary (bee yard). We have captured 2 swarms in the last couple of days, harvested 55 pounds of "exceptional" honey and medicated for those awful bee diseases.

This year, we struggled with a couple of bee diseases which destroyed 2 of our hives. No amount of medication, special sugar water, immune support (and on and on) seemed to help. While extracting our honey, I complained to our bee mentor.

"We lost 2 hives to nosema this year," I said.

"Really, that's awful," he replied filling the extractor. "Did you medicate?"

"Yes," I replied feeling ashamed. I did what I knew to do and it still didn't work. "It wasn't only the nosema, we also had chill brood (an awful fungi which causes the bees to die in their cocoon)."

"That's a deadly combination," he replied turning on the extractor.

"Ya," I said.? "Is there anything I could have done?"

"You know Claudia," he said looking up at me over his half glasses. "No matter how much we know about bees, they still remain mysterious. You have to try everything... then sometimes there's nothing you can do. They are insects."

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