The Bee Hive

(I wrote this before the freeze.)

I thought that bees made their hives in hollow trees or built hives that look like the ringed yellowish mound that’s always on the honey jar label or on all those road signs in Utah. I was surprised to find this hive being constructed in a lemon tree next to my driveway: three flat honeycombs and a fourth one getting started. They worked hard at it for weeks. Their single minded concentration was fascinating. Hundreds of bees working—well, like busy bees— and very few flying around looking for food. I loved watching them. If they became a problem I planned to call one of my avocado grower friends to get the name of a beekeeper who might want them. Avocados need bees to help them pollinate and you often see hives in avocado groves. But they never became a problem. I hadn’t looked at them for a while and checked on them several weeks after I took this picture. They were all gone.

January Freeze

As I begin to write this the temperature is 25.7, the lowest of the night. It’s 6:30 in the morning. It is usually coldest just before sunrise.

I think the lemon crop for this coming year is lost. It will take a few weeks to actually see the ruined fruit, but there is little doubt that it is gone. Now the question is, for most of my neighbors, whether the trees themselves will survive.

Last Thursday/Friday, January 11/12, was the coldest it has been on the farm. It was 24 degrees for a length of time—I don’t know exactly how long. I’ve been told that two hours at 24 degrees can kill a lemon tree. I know it was under 27 degrees for several hours.

My farm has always been in a quirky position on frost protection. Way back the original ranch was subdivided into three narrow strips a half mile long. My place is the center ranch. As it turned out the existing wind machines were on both sides of us. When we bought the place Ben offered to share the cost of running the machines. Both neighbors refused, probably because they didn’t want the responsibility and the liability that might be involved. The result was that for the past twenty years we have freeloaded on our neighbors. We got to sleep on freezing nights and were spared the expense, which can be considerable. Yet it is a hell of a mess not to have control over something so vital. All I can do is bite my fingernails and hope they run their wind machines.

My area of California can rely on wind machines for frost protection because our normal cold isn’t that cold and doesn’t last too long. I don’t know the official statistics but it seems like 28-30 degrees for less than half an hour might be as cold as it gets in a typical year. Wind machines can stir up the air enough to raise the temperature one or two degrees, which is enough in a typical year to prevent significant damage.

This is not a typical year. One of my neighbors hasn’t run his machines this winter. I’ve bit my lip and hoped for the best. While I’m in no position to complain to them I finally just couldn’t stand not knowing why they were ignoring the cold. After it was 24 last Friday morning I got the idea that perhaps one of them was seriously ill—the only plausible reason I could think of for not running the machines. This gave me an excuse to call and ask how they were. They were all fine. I found out that their farm manager had told them that the lower orchard (the part where I could see the wind machines) didn’t get cold enough to need the machines so that was why he wasn’t running them. 24 degrees not cold enough!?

My neighbor on the other side is a flower grower. He has been running his wind machines, which gives me a little protection, except he didn’t run them this morning. I am afraid it means that his crop has already been wiped out. No use in closing the barn door once the horse is out.

So, probably no farm income this year. It kinda takes the fun out of it.