Easter Bee

Honeybee keeping is making a comeback. All the news about 'colony collapse disorder' has gotten environmentally-aware folks into bee keeping, which is a good thing for all of us.

A photographer friend, David Stover, has been keeping bees for a couple years. Now, my neighbor Stacy Moulds and her husband Charlie Field are going to start here in Church Hill (they went to bee-keeping class last week!)

Yesterday, I walked out of the studio to admire the redbud trees we planted a few years ago. I was surprised to see honey bees all over the blossoms.

Trying to photograph the tiny honey bees was challenging (for me, anyway) and I realized (again) why I'm not a nature photographer. I'll leave that to the wildlife pros like Lynda Richardson.

I shot this with one of my back-up cameras, the Canon 50D, hoping the multiplier effect of the smaller sensor would help get me "closer" to the tiny bees. I used a medium zoom 24mm-135mm lwna, with a screw-on +2 close-up filter, 200iso, 200th of a second at f11.

A honey bee moves faster than a 2 year-old on twinkies. Using auto-focus, I struggled to keep up. Shot a bunch of frames...I like this one because it shows the all-important pollen ball on the bee's right leg. I hope this bee and all it's bee-buddies make it back to the hive and live it up!