wild (life) adventures

I've been so busy with end of the (CC) year stuff that I did not have time to post about our back yard wild life adventures last weekend!  We started the day last Friday with a cat rescue from the neighbor's tree.  This poor kitty had been stuck up there for more than 48 hours.  Both the fire department and animal control said they don't rescue cats from trees :( and that eventually he would come down on his own.

This gives you a better perspective of exactly how high up he was in that tree.

Finally, after we had listened to his pitiful cries for two whole days his owners found him and brought their ladder for a daring rescue.  It took some coaxing, but I am glad to report that the rescue operation was a success!

Then, that afternoon the boys discovered a swarm of honey bees in our tree!  A quick google search led me to a local bee keeping couple who had already relocated one swarm that day and said they could come right away to help with ours!  It was a field trip in our own back yard!

So this is what 15,000+ bees looks like when they are protecting their queen and waiting for their scouts to find them a new home.  Pretty amazing!

The bee keepers got all suited up, climbed up the ladder with their vented Rubbermaid, and started shacking the tree branch.

A lot of bees made it into the box, but a lot fell on the ground or stayed in the tree, so they got out their bee vac and started vacuuming up the rest of the swarm.

They said they were pretty sure they had gotten the queen because so many of the bees were all over the box - the bees are drawn to the pheromones the queen releases.

Bob and Susie were so patient answering all my many questions and not minding us all standing by and watching the whole process.  It really was fascinating!