Dreams of Summer

The Bees Venture Out.

It has been cold and damp, mostly damp. Britain has been in the grip of the worst rain storms and flooding since records began. Now records began about 60 years ago but all the same the Somerset Levels are no longer a valley but a sea. In fact they've been a sea since before Christmas. However the stoical people of the west country didn't complain until Dawlish railway station fell in the sea and great lumps of ballast were thrown onto the high street by the waves. 

Politicians finally got their wellies on when the Thames started to rise a bit. Once people in the Thames Valley were getting wet feet tories could see their constituencies being reduced to silt and finally pulled their fingers out. Apparently the environment agency had been told that every pound they spent had to reap an 8 to 1 reward. That is to say if they spent £1 it had to return an £8 benefit in economic terms. Consequently farmland in the west country was less of a priority than Tory voters' homes  near the Thames.

And it seems that central southerners are a bunch of whingeing nancies. There they were on telly in their galoshes "We have heard there could be a lot of rain tonight. What are the government going to do about it?" while the West Country folk were taking the kids to school in a rowing boat and dressing them in waders "..Yes" said one woman "It's gettting a bit tiresome now. The sofa floated away and the cat wont come down off the roof but we're making the best of it" 

A friend of mine who lives by the sea but works in Exeter rang me in frustration saying it had taken her nearly 2 hours to get to work because the flooding had finally damaged her car exhaust and she'd had to go to work by bus. In london people take the day off if theres a danger of the wrong kind of leaves on the line. After all little Tarquin couldn't be expected to have to shake the dew off his jacket at school. He might catch a cold.

Enough with the sarcasm. It has been terrible. People have died and friends have suffered. Our garden is waterlogged but it looks worse than it is because agent chicken has completely defoliated the environs. However the clever little cluckers are laying an egg a day each now so they have earned the right to be a little demanding. We're very proud. They haven't really enjoyed the underwater aspect but we can proudly say that the only part of our back yard that isn't muddy is their Chicken Run. Cluckingham Palace is a Des Res indeed.

Bees

The ladies have weathered the winter. It hasn't been cold but it's been wet and that can cause problems of it's own. This morning when I let the hens out I ventured over to look at the hive. Over the last couple of months it has been very quiet, just the occasional brave soul checking to see all was clear but today you could hear the buzz from the back step.

When I looked out of our bedroom window I could see hundreds of bees drawing lazy spirals around the hive as they orientated themselves to their environment. At this stage in the year they may well be new bees who are venturing out for the first time ever. I know that bees communicate their location easily to their compadres but it is amazing to think that bees who have been quietly working away in the hive since their birth can know what is expected of them without ever having seen the outside world.

But for today, in the early spring sun they looked like drops of sunshine from heaven and made me dream of summer.