There is poetry in all things if you look for it. Language, and how we speak about a thing, carries incredible power. Language shapes our world view. It shapes our understanding and our relating.

honey bees, beautyAri DalyJuly 7, 2021bees, melissae, language, honey, poetryComment

Food for Bees

Do you feed your bees?

Bees get their nutrients from flowers. Pollen provides protein, fatty acids and minerals, while nectar provides energy through carbohydrates (sugars) and minerals/vitamins.

chemical-free beekeeping, Honey, honey bees, natural beekeeping, NatureAri DalyFebruary 2, 2020honey, natural beekeeping, leaveitforthebees, nosugar, beesComment

You are the Bridge

Where did it begin? This love affair? This obsession? This reverence? Was it in our prehistoric ancestors, with fire in their hands, climbing the highest of heights to gain your nectar? Was it in the way your honey and pollen aided in the development of our ancient brains?

honey bees, sacred, Sacred FeminineAri DalyJanuary 25, 2020beekeeping, beekeepinghistory, science, religion, feministbeekeepingComment

Hymenoptera: veil-winged

Hymenoptera: veil-winged. An order of insects including wasps, sawflies and honey bees, but particularly connected, linguistically, to the goddess culture at its ties to the honey bees. Hymen is derived from Greek and means “membrane” or “veil”. It denotes not only the veil within the virginal maiden, but also the veil draped before in innermost sanctum of the temple of the goddess. It also came to represent the veil between the outer world and the hidden inner world of women’s mysteries, both physically and spiritually.

Sacred Feminine, Feminist Beekeeping, honey beesAri DalyJanuary 11, 2020hymenoptera, greekmythology, veil, beekeeping, bees, pleiadesComment

A crown of Ivy

It happens every year. I am on a walk on a warm fall day in November. The kind of day where you start your walk with a hat and a sweater and end your walk in a t-shirt. It’s always the sound that catches my attention. So late in the season, it’s unusual to hear the loud hum of many foraging bees.

gardening, honey beesAri DalyNovember 11, 2019ivy, druid lore, plant lore, dionysus, maenadsComment

Re-piecing A Hive Together

I dreamt last night of a hive torn to pieces. Every bit of comb on the ground was covered in bees. It was the largest hive I’d ever witnessed. Night was approaching and I had to gather all the bees and broken comb. I had to provide them with a new home in a hollow under my bed before it got too cold. Many people around me were oblivious, but some unexpected friends and family came to help. No one had protective clothing. We gently took up each comb with bare hands. Despite the darkness, despite the cold, despite the gravity of destruction, the bees didn’t sting. They understood we were here to help.

Dreaming, honey beesAri DalyOctober 10, 2019fortheloveofit, bees, wildanimals, wild, planetearth, dreamsComment

Shamanism Meets Tea Time

I’m about to board another flight to London. I seriously can not wait for scones and tea at No. 9 on the Green in Wimborne. I am visualizing pouring cream into a saucer as I write. Heaven.

Dreaming with Nature

The dreams were waking me up at night. Black widows inside my home. Black widows all over the ceiling. Black widows building webs closer and closer to me. No way out. I am not particularly afraid of spiders, although I am cautious of black widows, having grown up in an old 1930s home. I tried to reason out why I was having these nightmares. I read about black widow symbolism. I questioned my relationship to spider, web and venom. For two weeks my nights were filled with the dark ladies. Then, one morning, after other terrifying infestation dream, I opened my eyes and said aloud “It’s my bees. There is a black widow inside my hive.”

honey bees, Dreaming, NatureAri DalyAugust 1, 2017dreams, shamanism, bees, nature, spirit, martin shaw Comments

Stalking the Wild Feminine

It’s going to be hot out there. No-option-but-naked kind of hot. Snake weather.

The bees will be gathering water from the banks of the Eel. The water ouzel will be dancing her grey-winged hop up and down the river. The bears wont come near. There are too many of us.

feminine, honey bees, sacred, travelAri DalyJuly 20, 2017bees, snake, wilderness, backpacking, feminine, nature, dreams Comments

Honey Bees as Heart Healers

We women of the bee work in cycles of six. Six-sided, six threads, six sisters, six revolutions. Six years. On this day, six year ago, I found out I was pregnant. It’s a old story really, one that’s been told before, in different words by different women, but it’s also my story with the bees, and therefore, it has a place here. I found out I was pregnant because of a dream. Not my own; that of a friend.

The Big Bad Varroa Ally

This morning I sat in a garden teaming with the birds and the bees. Humming birds noisily darted between creeping vines of nasturtiums, red raspberries hung plump and inviting from semi-orderly thickets, honeybees swooned in the fuzzy clumps of borage, and zucchini’s performed their summer competition for Most Alarmingly Large Vegetable.

How to Get New Bees

In Northern California there is still snow in the hills and rain on the weather forecast. However, despite the winter chill, it’s time to start thinking about getting bees. Regardless of where you live, late winter is the time most local bee breeders start selling bee packages and nuc. You wont receive your bees until the spring, but if you want to ensure you’re going to get bees this season, it’s best to buy them now.

honey bees, natural beekeeping, getting beesAri DalyFebruary 1, 2016package, nuc, swarm, genetics, breed, buy, bees, season, top bar hive, warre, langstrothComment

A Walk Through an Herbalist's Garden

Melissa bends low and plucks a small herb growing out of the cobble stones in front of her house. She holds it up to the light and shows me the tiny perforated holes in the leaves.

“That’s how you can tell it’s the medicinal St. John’s Wort.”

feminine, honey bees, sacredAri DalyOctober 15, 2015herbs, medicine, st johns wort, hawthorne, bees, hives, wild, steward Comments

Beautiful Homes for Ladies and Bees

Sometimes it's important to take a moment to simply appreciate beauty. Physical beauty. Beauty of nature. Beauty of place. Beauty of soul. I've been thinking a lot about beauty lately. Beauty as a power that evokes a sense of peace, wonder and love.

An Apiary in the Hedgerows

Angharad has just returned from a walk with a handful of blackberries, elderflowers, nettle and apple. She is going to make a fruit crisp and some tea. Three things about this:

1) Angharad wildcrafts like some people (me) frequent cafes; It’s a nonchalant, every-day sort of thing.

travel, honey bees, wildcraftingAri DalySeptember 21, 2015apiary, farm, hedgerow, bees, sting, public footpath, cottage, herbsComment

A Water Way

California is burning right now. When I left my home state the air quality of my town was registering at the most hazardous level it can go. Can’t even leave the house, they say. Strange then, to come to a place with so much water.

travel, honey bees, feminineAri DalySeptember 19, 2015bees, water, hot springs, roman, minerva, bath, bathe, feminineComment

Bee Abroad

I’m 4,875 meters above England, moving at a ground speed of 463 km/h. To my left the sun is doing that peaches-on-a-bed-of-whipped-cream thing to the clouds. It’s obviously very beautiful. And I’m trying out this whole blogging thing because we can blog from the sky now. And also because of bees.

music, travel, honey beesAri DalySeptember 15, 2015Oslobees, travel, piano, oslo, norway, flight, burningman Comment