If you happen to be a honeybee and your hive gets hot — and trust me, it’s been hot for them too lately –  it’s considered improper behavior to just buzz down to the local DQ and dip your proboscis in a cherry Mr. Misty.

Instead, you’ll likely be called upon to help air condition the baby bee nursery. If the wee ones get too toasty, they won’t develop quite right, so sometimes all hands (or in this case, feet) need to gather water to take back to the hive to use as a sort of misting system to beat the heat. In the photo below, it may look like the bees are taking a dip in the lake, but they’re not soaking. They are using the closest water source for the good of the colony.

Of course, it’s not uncommon to see honeybees doing a bit of hanging out on the front porch of their hives fanning their wings either. Like humans, they are probably hoping to catch a slight breeze, or maybe just clearing out of the house so their own body heat doesn’t make the hive hotter. Still, I was alarmed on Monday when I saw a huge number of bees on the outside of a hive box.

I worried that the warmth was triggering a sense of overcrowding and the colony might be getting ready to swarm. Swarming is actually a pretty amazing phenomenon where the colony divides itself and half the residents go looking for new digs. But it makes non-beekeepers nervous and usually means a drop in honey production, so I’d really rather not have the hive go there.

When I opened up the colony and looked through the frames, I saw honey, pollen and brood. Fortunately, I didn’t see clear evidence it had swarming on its collective mind. I’ll keep a close eye on it. But for now, I think it’s just hot, but still at home.

Want to know more about bees, urban beekeepers or swarming? The Home + Garden section has a great story and video this week. Want even more? Here’s a roundup of honeybee books, too!

Things are hopping at my micro homestead these days. I heaved such a sigh of relief when it rained this weekend!

In past years, we’ve tried to have at least a couple of hives of honeybees. We keep them in the backyard, so they are easy to keep track of. Or, at least that was the plan.

This year, we have six hives, and even though it’s convenient to check on them, things happen fast if you’re not paying attention. I know this, of course, from experience. Ignore the bees for a few weeks and they decide to swarm (and if they swarm, you’re not going to get much honey from them).  The goal this year is no swarms. So far, so good. Now if we just keep getting rain, there will be nectar for them, too.

Meanwhile, in the chicken coop, it’s utter chaos. Of the 12 eggs that hatched from the last incubation, we still have seven chicks (we bartered most of the others for maple syrup) and even though they aren’t big enough to run with the hens, they are too big for their little chick abode, so we find them in odd places lately.

Right after the “littles” hatched, our hen, Coco, went broody. She was determined to sit on eggs and be a mama, and though we tried for over a week to convince her otherwise, we couldn’t. About that time, my partner discovered a whole clutch of eggs behind a bush in the yard. By their size, we knew they were eggs laid by one of our young, shy hens. We didn’t know how long they’d been there. We picked out the best-looking eggs and gave them to Coco to sit on. We didn’t really expect many, if any of them to hatch. But when we opened the coop door a couple of weeks ago, there were five babies peeking out from under Coco.

We’ve been getting great harvests of lettuces and other greens from the garden lately. It’s so wonderful to eat a huge salad of field greens. I’ve pulled a few onions for salads too. The peas should bloom soon, and the beans and cukes are up. I’m starting to see scapes on the garlic, and I finally got the potatoes planted. I have dutifully picked off the blossoms of the strawberries so they put their energy into roots this first year instead. And remember the hideous-looking rhubarb from earlier this year? It’s growing!

But while I’ve been being a beekeeper and beak-keeper, the weeds in the garden have made hay. Actually, they weren’t weeds last year. They were mustard and tatsoi. Apparently I let some of them go to seed — and now I have the best crop ever. At least I always have something to do.

So, what’s still on your to-do list? Or are you all caught up? (And if you are, would you like some chicks?)

By now, I bet you’ve heard… the City of Minneapolis is abuzz over the possibility that residents may soon be able to (legally) keep honeybees. Read all about it if you haven’t already:

Minneapolis drew closer to legalizing hives after the City Council heard from “stealth beekeepers.”

For those of you who garden, this is very good news. The pollination heroics of honeybees (and bumblebees) are becoming better known and appreciated all the time.

I didn’t move out of Minneapolis five years ago because the city wouldn’t allow me to keep bees. But I did get bees as soon as I moved to the country. They seemed like livestock I could manage.

Last weekend, we settled three new colonies into the hive boxes in the backyard. Two also made it through the winter, for a total of five (assuming I didn’t squash a queen putting the boxes back together).

Finding the colonies doing well after winter is like getting together again with old friends.  It’s a pleasure to clean the boxes, tidy up the beeyard and make sure the colonies have pollen and food until the nectar flow comes on.

Keeping bees makes me a better gardener because I’m keenly aware of seasonal changes and more knowledgeable about plants and how they reproduce. I like to think I’m a slightly better person because some bees are willing to hang out with me.

Would you hang out with bees if it becomes legal in Minneapolis? What would you need to know to get started?

Or to ease your mind if the idea of honeybees nearby sounds more daunting than beneficial?

Honeybees are in peril. You probably already know this from the many news reports over the last few years about mites and Colony Collapse Disorder.

This past Saturday, many local beekeepers got more bad news. A truckload of honeybees bound for Minnesota from California encountered difficulties that led to all the thousands upon thousands of bees dying en route.

Many beekeepers, myself included, replenish their honeybee populations each spring by buying “packages” of bees from suppliers in the south or California. Packages include two or three pounds of worker bees and a queen that establish a new colony. We often use packages to replace colonies that didn’t make it through the winter.

We need these packages to arrive in the spring in so there’s time to rear enough worker bees to gather nectar when lots of plants are blooming. If there are not yet enough bees when the most nectar flows, nectar will be left ungathered. That means less honey, and perhaps more importantly, incomplete pollination of crops such as apples, berries, melons, cucumbers, pumpkins and so on.

I feel badly for beekeepers, some of whom are fresh from the University of Minnesota’s beekeeping class and eager to put their new knowledge to work. We need all the beekeepers we can get. Others affected are people who depend on honeybees for part of their income. Some, like me, just enjoy working bees because it grounds us to the changing seasons and we appreciate the magic of making honey.

I also feel badly for the local distributor who has to answer lots of questions from those of us who are trying to figure out what to do now. He’s been great. And I know it has to be a very painful experience for him. If his customers don’t have bees, they won’t need bee supplies, which he sells, either. I want him to stay in business. I feel, too, for the bee supplier in California. And the truck driver. And farmers. And, of course, bees. As if they didn’t have enough challenges.

And I feel a little frightened that an accident in a storm two states away can impact so many people here. I can’t help but think about how tenuous our food supply chain can be. It’s mighty easy to take for granted that what’s in my refrigerator now will always be available. I might complain that it costs more to restock it, but at least it’s available.

I don’t want to over react to this accident. After all, we’ve got two hives that did make it through the winter, so even if we don’t get the four packages we ordered, we are still likely to have enough honey for baking and tea. But I’m keenly aware that others might not be so fortunate. Then again, I might not always be, either.

So, what did you learn in your garden this year? Here’s my list:

1. Red plastic mulch is alright, but it’s a pain to put down. Entertain the neighbors and decide to do it on a windy day.

2. Green plastic tomato supports were great in May, but burly ‘maters popped off their arms and made them look like weaklings by August.

3. If you plant several kinds of sauce tomatoes and they all grow, you’ll be standing in the kitchen at midnight making tomato sauce several nights a week in September.

4. Potato beetles suck.

5. If you want cucumbers, you actually have to get around to planting them, not just buying seeds and saying “I should get the cukes planted today” until fall.

6. Oregano is wonderful on homemade pizza. I need to grow much more of it.

7. You can grow peaches in Minnesota. At least this year.

8. Planting beans and peas is a nice way to feed the local wildlife.

9. Pollinators like honeybees need all they help they can get.

10. One of the most satisfying things I can think of is sitting down to dinner and counting up the ingredients that came from your garden.