Bees equal fruit

Without pollination we would have no fruit come harvest time. It is very important to make sure everything is sufficiently pollinated during blossom time. In order to accomplish this we order bees to place in the orchard. There were a few issues with shipping this time making things a little more stressful than normal but I was there to take pictures while Rene' put one of the hives in the orchard.

Also managed to get a shot of a big honey bee in the apricots. There were thousands of native bees out there in those trees. They looked like little specks buzzing around the tops of the trees.

The row of apricots was in full bloom last week. The white blossoms are hard to see against the gray sky. Between the truck and the trees is a beehive.

I thought the black and white of the apricot blossoms looked artistic so I wanted to share it with you. Hopefully no one tires of blossom pictures...I love taking them! I am in fact planning to go out tomorrow to take more now that the plums, pears, cherries, peaches and apples are all in various states of bloom. You can look for a post on the different fruit blossoms next week.

In the latter part of last week a cold front took over where we had experienced warm and balmy temperatures. The heat had brought on the blooming of the trees and we had concerns that the cold snap would freeze out the crop. Although it did get cold for a couple of nights we did not lose all of the apricots. There was likely some loss but we are still looking forward to having some delicious fruit to sell in a few short months. More cold temps are likely on there way so we will continue to pray for the protection of our precious trees.

In other news I took several head shots of Suzanne for some different projects and wanted to share one with you all. She is looking forward to starting work at Green City on Saturdays and Museum of Contemporary Art when summer markets roll around in a month or so.

~Christina