For those who were unfamiliar with the bee colony collapse problem, CNN has a story on it today. Thirty-six percent of commercial hives lost since last year.

Cabol told me to go do something while waiting for the furniture to arrive today (it’ll probably coincide with a thunderstorm). So I went down to the beehives, since they are way past due to have their mite medicine removed, and the feeders from the winter taken off.

All three hives seem to have made it through the winter. The one closest to the garden (which blew over in the middle of the winter) still seems the smallest, but there were bees in it, at least. I put a new super on the middle one, and the third one had comb built on about half its top super.

I know a real beekeeper would take the supers off each other and check each one and see how things are going, but I’m too scared of the bees to spend any more time down there than necessary. Maybe if there is no drought this year we’ll get some honey to harvest, although having living hives these days is a feat unto itself.

Anya and I went down to the barn to see how things were going.

Buddy came with us.

Buddy likes Anya.

All the babies were hanging out together.

I think these are Sadie’s.

Well, I’m at home today because Anya is sick, and Cabol said it was my turn to stay home with her. I went down to the barn a little while ago, and little black sheep seems sort of confused on who her mommy is. Her mouth feels warm, and I’ve seen her futzing around under Pearl, so I think she is feeding. But when Pearl went back into the barn to eat, the baby was confused and baaaaaaaing outside and following Sadie around. At one point, she even forced her way through the fence and came after me. I put her back in the barn with Pearl, but it’s still a little worrisome.

Sadie has a pair of toes sticking out of her hoo-hah, so I expect more babies today.

UPDATE: Two more sheep outside with Sadie. A black and a white one. Now that won’t get confusing.

Another hard day of lambing here at the Loafkeeper residence. We wake up, go to work, come back, and find Pearl with these:

The black one seems a little less aggressive than the white one, so I think Cabol will go down later and maybe give her a little nutra-drench. They both appear to be girls.

I think another might soon be on the way, too. Check out Sadie: