I guess he just couldn't wait for it to open!

Seil, I guess not...lol

I AM SOOOO JEALOUS JIM, SOOOO JEALOUS!!!!! Kansas Honeybees hate roses and are the hardest creatures on this planet to please!!! If it hadn't been for my prolific Russian Sage I'd be having a total nervous breakdown trying to get those bees to visit my garden!!!!!! I'm so jealous, Jim, a rose-loving bee!!!!

Great blooms too Jim! Love the color of Livin' Easy.

Folks, I told Jim that he's got the Carniolan honeybee strain/hybrid. Sorry Jim, for hijacking your thread, lol! But I'm just so excited about sharing some of the things the folks at the beemaster forum have been teaching me about the bees.

Last year mine were the golden Italians. This bee that I thought was weak is actually a young juvenile bee. The scary thing is that juveniles are not thrown to work so quickly unless the hive has been either poisoned or under some sort of stress. When bees mature, they gradually become more and more glossy from rubbing against each other or from fighting invaders.

Juvenile Italian honeybee:
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This is what a mature Italian looks like. Notice how Jim's bee has a fatter black end and compare it with my Italian strain. It is more elliptical in shape and has a much more shallow black in its ending stripe. Also my bee has longer wings compared to Jim's.
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Now the bee that visited my Holly is definitely Jim's Carnolian bee hybrid because of the heavy black and "pointy" tip and the shorter wings.

This year I'm getting a mix of the Cordovan with the Italian on the Russian sage-- the spring Holly's Carniolan bees have seemed to disappear...I need to update more photos...The current Russian sage ones are more "elliptical" so not quite as short of an abdomen as Jim's Carnolian, but whereas some are darker like a Cordovan, some have the very light honey coloration of the Italian. According to the beekeepers they say sometimes a wandering queen will pick up different genes from other bees as well or a beekeeper's hive faces a queen loss and another queen is brought in. However, beekeeping is outlawed in my county sooooo????? who knows it's all a mystery...

Cordovan???

Here is a closeup of just the face which is sort of cool.

Tomorrow I'll try to snag some photos of the Italians, weather permitting...Cordovan looks like a mix between the dark of a Carniolan bee but more longer body like the Italian. Italian is sooo unmistakeable. Very light, honey yellow in its body...

Will update when I snag in some photos of the Italians' return to my garden.

I was watching bees positively rolling in the pollen of roses.

Mr. Jim glad to see you've got honeybees that means your roses are healthy and safe for them to come to. Keep up the good work and thanks for posting.
Harold

Thanks everyone! Great bee pics there Serena!

ANYBODY having bee pics are welcome to post in this thread, the more the merrier...

Hehe, Jim and back to you to Add more Livin' Easy's here! You are doin' Boxo proud on how well your Livin' Easy is doing! So healthy and very gorgeous orange! I always look forward to your blooms.

I am again sooooo jealous when you told me about all the 50+ honeybees on your clover. I can't get my honeybees to visit my clover. They are busy obsessing with my Russian sage--got tons and tons of bees but it gets boring for most folks but not so for yours cuz you have MODEL BEES that pose here then pose there, haha!....More bee pics, Jim. You've got the floral variety. You've also got cute marigolds with the honeybees for those. Mine are not cooperating one bit with any other flower besides that Russian sage, lol!

Honeybees love the clover here. Wild clover that pops up throughout the yard.
Bumblebees seem to be hanging out on our Petunias this year.

Hey Jim LOVE those pics! If I could remember how to post a pic inside a message, I'd post one of my bee pics here too...it's been awhile!

Great pics! I am a bee lover :) I don't know squat about them, but I meet a lot of them.

The absolute favorite plant of mine here are the boxwoods when they bloom. I wouldn't have noticed that they bloom if it weren't for the scores of honey bees.

Next is either clover or my anise hyssop. That hyssop attracts all sorts of bees and pollinatrs, all at once. It's actually a strange sight :D

Well if you remember rozaholik, I'd like to see your bee pics!
Thanks for the comment there meredith e!

Wow, spectacular pics, Jim and Serena.

Jim, your pics of Livin Easy are spectacular, the color really glows.

Serena, thank you for the intersting info, and great pics, of the bees.

OK Mr Jim you asked for it so here's my bee picture.
Harold

Silly me that's not a Bee here's my Bee

Wow Harold! Love the Lizard & bee! Great pics!
Here some more from me...

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NOT EXACTLY A BEE EITHER, but HERE'S A TAILESS Squirrel:

Wowza, wowza Jim, absolutely briiiiiilliant and soooo clear! Harold fantastic and Beautiful roses. I love the lizard too, so neat looking. Harold I accidentally found a link about what a great nectar plant a lime bush is. It can support an entire hive for an entire year, they say! It made me think of Adele's DELICIOUS KEY LIME PIE!!!!!! YUM, YUM FOR ME! YUM YUM for the honeybees and ME. Between Adele's lime pies and Boxo's Honey-Glazed Smoked Sockeye Salmon, I'm ready to EAT, haha!!!!!

Harold the bee that you are seeing is a carpenter bee. Carpenter bees look a lot like bumblebees but they are completely different creatures. You can always recognize a carpenter because it has a bumblebee torso but the back is a very shiny hard black shell. Bumblebees nest in the ground. Carpenter bees drill holes in wood and hide there. They are a bit possessive and tend to chase off other bees as well. They actually do not pollinate the way honeybees and bumblebees do either. They cut the stamen as opposed to gathering pollen. Honeybees and Bumblebees spread pollen so it's far more beneficial to the actual flower. Lol, Harold as you can tell, I'm a changed girl. I've done so much research on the honeybees, probably overwhelming the rose folks in how much research I've gathered. And now I'm starting to learn all the techno terms on how beekeepers organize their slats, the swarm divisions, all the Bee-tech, and the bee slang things too, heehee!

Boy Jim I really like your squirrel, I'd feed him sunflower seeds till he grew a new tail. Ha Ha

Serena, my head buzzzz with all this knowledge of bees, thanks for the info. Now I can talk the talk. LOL LOL

I have no idea what this insect is? Anybody know?

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Jim, that is such a cool looking moth! Maybe it's a hummingbird hawk moth?

butterfly hawk moth

But only a few Google image show transparent wings so my guess is that it depends on the age of the moth...

Everyone my Russian sage Cordovan honeybees are crazy fast and very frenetic so I'm having a heck of a time trying to photograph. And nope I'm not seeing the Italians back at this point. I wanted to send up more brag photos on how many gather within inches, but this year my honeybees are speed demons and at the same time extremely skittish. As soon as I try to get near, they freak and run off to a different stem, and my camera can't get the shots, lol! Oh, well. On the other hand I was able to get quite a few of Jim's Carnolian honeybees because they returned to a different section of my garden. They are visiting the oregano big-time and I'm guessing they are staying away from the Cardovan gang! The Carnolians are much slower moving and easier to photograph. Bee in the hood, hahaha! It's fun to have 2 gangs of honeybees....Now I have to download and cross my fingers that the camera did what it was supposed to do, lol!

Might be a hummingbird Hawk-Moth... Hummmm

I'll take HUNGRY for a thousand Alex, er I mean Jim ;-)