Purple Passion!

Bees don't care if it's lavender, fuchsia,  or nearly black, they love the purple blooms!

Peony at Royal Botanic Garden, Edinburgh 

Royal Botanic Garden, Edinburgh

Union Canal Path, Edinburgh

Roadside, Sarlat-la-Caneda France

Thistle make great honey!

The thistle is the national emblem of Scotland and, as an ancient Celtic symbol, represents noble character! These flowering plants are plentiful in Scotland, in the city as well as rural areas. Thistle plants have flowers along with sharp prickles to protect themselves from being eaten, but the flowers are a rich source of nectar attracting all kinds of insects, and the bees especially love them!

Union Canal Thistle Bee

Arthur's Seat Thistle Moth

Union Canal Thistle Bee

Arthur's Seat Thistle Bee

Bees in Bells

I am fascinated over and over again by the variety of shapes, colors, and wonderful smells in any outdoor landscape or garden!
Here are a few "bell-shaped" blossoms. There are bees are in the foxglove and prickly pear (you'll need a good eye to spot her!), but I've never seen the other pink bell flower before.  If you know its name, please comment :)

Edinburgh, Scotland

Monpazier, France

Perigueux, France

Tuscon, Arizona

Clover Bees

A clover without a bee is like a hug without a kiss! 

Holyrood Park, Edinburgh

Monpazier, France Medieval Garden

Sarlat, France Public Garden

Holyrood Park, Edinburgh

Château de Losse

This time of year, there are so many beautiful gardens to visit! Each blossom is breathtaking, its beauty only enhanced by a fuzzy, flighty bee. These lovely shots are from the Château de Losse along the Vézère River in the South-West of France.

Pretty in Pink!

Just too pretty not to share...Some bees, some blossoms!

Pollen baskets are looking good!

Cotton candy tree...

Coming in for a landing!

Bee-hinds

One of the tricky thing about photographing bees is their speed! Sometimes I can't see them, but I can hear them so I just point and shoot in that direction. Other times, I can see them, or the one whose picture I'd like to take, but the girls are in a hurry and don't like to pose very long...

On a few recent attempts, I've ended up with only bee-hinds! Can you spot them?

Bee-hind on the walk to Temniac, France.

Bee-hind in the public garden at Domme, France.

Bee-hind in the wisteria, Sarlat, France.

Temniac Blooms

It was a beautiful day for a walk from Sarlat to Temniac and so many blooms to see along the way! The crab apple trees were humming with bees, I couldn't resist trying to catch the image. Looking into the sun with the camera, I didn't know what would appear. When I got home, each picture had a bee in it! Lucky day :)

Purple Iris - reminds me of my Grandma's garden...

Happy Spring '13!

I've got the first bee spotting of 2013, so it must be time to post :) These gardens are too beautiful not to include...This is a simple "green space" near our hotel in Bordeaux, France. It's unbelievable, especially coming form snow at home!

There were even roses blooming in this little oasis.

I visited the public gardens which were breathtaking, and bright with splashes of color...

Best part of the day, a bee working hard on a pansy!

Gil's Garden

I went to visit my friend and urban gardener extraordinaire, Gil, recently and got a beautiful sunny day to check out his garden wonderland! He has maximized growing in a mid-sized Minneapolis yard to include squash, melons, more tomato varieties than I could count, herbs, kale, cabbage, cucumbers tomatillos,  as well as amaranth and other grains. What a green thumb! But can you guess what caught my eye? An urban hive - no wonder his bounty is so great! Bees love to pollinate fruits and vegetables, the shape and color of the flowers attract them. But, grains are not pollinated by bees, rather, by the wind! Here is the hive and a rabbit waiting for us to leave so it could sneak a snack :)

The bee and butterfly population in our garden is decreasing as the days get cooler and the flowers near the end of their season...The sunshine helps! These wondrous creatures have been working hard all summer to gather enough nectar and pollen to feed themselves over the winter. The bees store honey (and protein) around the queen and the brood with extra stored above them in the hive. This honey is the food for the bees during the winter. Bees can survive winter in Minnesota, but the colony needs to weigh 130-180# in our northern climate to get all the way through until springtime! The bees have been too fast for me lately, but in these photos they are caught in flight :)

Bee 2-4-1

Our bees seem to especially love the sedum flowers, any color will do! Worker bees, like the Queen, are all girls. These busy girls are gathering pollen or nectar, the pollen provides their protein and the nectar from flowers is their carbohydrate source. Bees are vegetarian while some wasps will eat aphids or something decomposing. Wasps can get carb from anything sweet and might even go after your pop or watermelon at a picnic!

It's a Girl!

If you look below at older posts for the caterpillar picture, that's a "before" photo - on Sunday, our butterfly emerged and slowly made her way across the yard! Girl butterflies do not have a "dot" on the bottom black line of the wing while boys do. So, no dot, it's a girl :) Here are a couple of "after" photos, isn't she beautiful? I'm a little teary...

Bees are fuzzy and have 2 sets of wings. Their "fuzz" attracts pollen with a little static charge making them great pollinators! Wasps are smooth with 2 sets of wings and some flies mimic bee appearance...they can be either fuzzy or smooth but only have 1 set of wings.

No promises that I haven't got a wasp or fly in the mix, but I'll do my best!

Have seen more grasshoppers out and about lately,  I saw two grasshoppers together and thought "how nice, a mom carrying a baby". Those in the know tell me this may, in fact, be romance...Either way, fun to catch!

Welcome!

Welcome! I love the bees in our garden and am learning about them and taking bee pictures at home and as I travel.
It's fun to be learning about these very complex little creatures!

While bees will certainly show up in my blog, expect blossoms and other garden visitors too :)

Giving Tree Gardens

Hen & Chick plant

3 cheers for Russ Henry at Giving Tree Gardens for creating our magical garden full of plants and flowers that bring life to our house and yard!! None of these home photos would be possible without his expertise and teaching. Thanks Russ!

Monarch Caterpillar

Wow, look who made an appearance today! The hungry caterpillar :)
One of those beautiful monarch butterflies found the milkweed, laid an egg, and now we have the next generation. Pretty neat! The dramatic coloring tells predators that they are poisonous.
This is a mature monarch caterpillar, the caterpillar stage lasts about 2 weeks, then we will watch for a chrysalis...stay tuned!

Check out today's garden visitor! This beauty wasn't shy, instead, was happy to pose for many photos. More exciting news, the milkweeds in our alley are spreading- yea! This is where mom monarch butterflies will lay their tiny, white, oblong eggs - on the milkweed leaf. Once they hatch, they first eat their egg shell (full of vitamins I understand) then go to work eating up the delicious milkweed leaves! If you'd like to learn more about monarchs, click here.