An Infamous Adventure

There is a story that has been in my family for decades now. An Infamous adventure had by my father and a friend of his when they were young men. A story about bees and the misadventures of people who were extravagantly under prepared and mostly ignorant of what they were getting themselves into.

At the parties my parents threw throughout my youth its mention drew regales of laughter and sighs of dread from those among the attendees who were familiar with the tale. Its telling was an event to remember to be sure in a sense it was both an epic failure and an ironic stand for the adage "stay the course." 

Parts of the hive assembly. 

The telling is a verse I will leave to my father. 

But as an interesting note: it seems that the infamy of the story held a special meaning to my father and roundabout two years ago he began talking about keeping bees. At first I didn't think much of it but as time went on it became apparent that this was not a "phase" and that he has a true desire to keep bees. 

Enter spring earlier this year when he stops by my house with four boxes and asks me to assemble hive bodies that would become known as Plant 2 & Plant 3. By this time we knew he was serious and I was happy to help, though careful to be sure that we didn't invent another fiasco as infamous as The Bee Story. 

I quickly found out that the plan was to capture and relocate a group of hives that had been found on a farm north of Leesburg. My initial visit to the farm was rather intimidating. 

 Photos of the first hive entrance.