Honey Dippers

I was strolling around our tiny postage stamp of a yard yesterday afternoon somewhat lost and searching for something to move me.  The day was waning and I needed a Project 365 image.  That's when the shrubbery on the side of the house caught my eye.  They were filled to the point of bursting with tiny white flowers.  (I imagine those pretty little flowers may be a contributing factor to The Kid's sinus misery of late but I thought they were lovely.)

Now I know what you are thinking...not more flowers!  If so, it's your lucky day.   I wasn't in a flower mood either.  Instead I stood quietly observing, hoping for an epiphany on how to photograph them in a unique way.  Waiting for the inner muse to speak.  He was silent.  Ideas were not forthcoming.  After a few minutes I began to notice that the tiny white blossoms were alive with honey bees. And the muse began to chatter.

Less than five minutes later I was set up in the grass; camera safely mounted on the tripod, wondering what happened to all of those bees.  They had vanished.



I waited.  And waited.  And amazingly the bees must have determine that I wasn't a threat and began returning to the shrubs to continue on with their work.  I watched as they flitted from blossom to blossom gathering nectar, and spreading pollen.  Initially I attempted to focus on the flighty little critters and snap them in flight.  That proved to be mission impossible.  Instead I settled for snapping them with their heads buried deep within the blossoms and stingers up.



Finally I figured it out.  If I increased the depth of field setting on the camera and manually focused in tight on one blossom I might get lucky.  I waited some more.  Eventually one of the little honeys wandered into my field of vision and I happily snapped away.  These are the best of the 400+ images I made while communing with the bees.



They really are amazing little creatures.  Buzzing and hovering, dipping and diving.  Their heads would disappear completely within the white blossoms only to emerge when the task was complete.  Their bodies at times would be yellow with pollen.  I began to notice that many of the bees had small, bright yellow balls which appeared to be attached to their rear legs.  A quick Google search told me that they are wax glands and the yellow masses were bees wax used in producing the honeycomb.



What I really learned from the experience is acceptance.  As long as I sat quietly in their midst I disappeared as a threat.  They flitted and buzzed around me and I felt no fear.  The edges of our two worlds blurred and the boundaries disappeared.  Each of us went about the task at hand accepting the other's presence in our lives.

Maybe there's a lesson there for the rest of the world.

Link to Project 365