There were a lot of calls made to see how they could be removed. One person wanted to try to get them to an orange grove for pollination. This morning I woke up earlier than normal and noticed a group of people across the street and a pest control truck. I had a sinking feeling, so I hurried out to see what was happening. They were all killed. We have a shortage of honey bees in the world, and they were killed. I'm so sad, so were a lot of other people here. They couldn't stay where they were, and apparently there was no local resources to relocate them either. It was a no win situation.
Since I was up so early, I got on the computer and chatted with mom, read the emails and a few blogs then turned on the NASA channel to watch the space shuttle Discovery land at Kennedy Space Center. It turns out that its approach route was going to take it right above us. It was scheduled to land a couple of minutes before noon, and we had a luncheon at the clubhouse starting at 11:30. So we went for our food and brought it back to the RV so we could monitor the landing on TV. When the tracker on TV showed it coming over the west coast of Florida (at Sarasota), Jim grabbed his Nikon camera and we went outside to watch. Sure enough, in between the clouds we could see the contrail.
We heard two tremendous sonic booms as it went by. Awesome! So now Discovery will be de-commissioned and sent to a museum. They haven't officially announced which museums will be getting the three shuttles, but it's pretty well known that Discover will go to the Air & Space Museum in Washington, DC. The end of an era...
Jim exercised the generator today. He turned the ac power off at the pedestal and started up our 5.5 kW Onan propane generator. We slowly turned on various appliances, the TV, and the air conditioner to put some stress on it. He then went outside and turned the breakers back on at the pedestal and then turned the generator off, to test the automatic changeover. Everything worked fine. It's been a while since we've moved, so we brought the slides in and back out to make sure they're still working ok. It hasn't happened to us yet (fingers crossed), but I imagine nothing puts a damper on a travel day like a slide motor that doesn't work. We're expecting company tomorrow so I also did some interior cleaning.
The weather was wonderful with a gentle breeze, so we both sat outside and just relaxed after our walk today. Remember as a kid you'd lay on your back in the grass and watch the clouds? I haven't done that in years, so today I laid back in my lounger and watched, and I saw this poodle running thru the sky. This photo doesn't do it justice, but I hope you can see it as I did.
It's may rain tomorrow, but we have the day planned with other RV'ers. Stay tuned.
27 days till we head North. I'm glad we're not up there now, it's still snowing and the South is having tornadoes.
6 comments:
That's a shame about the bees :( You'd a thought there would have been a beekeeper somewhere to smoke them and get them out.
That was a terrible thing to do to the bees, they are how our food crops become polinated. We will have armies of people polinating the crops with feathers, if it gets much worse.
The bees have enough trouble dying off from genetically modified foods crops, which is wiping them out with their doses of Round-Up in the GM seed.
"A German study may have identified a simple answer to the problem: The ongoing blight of genetically modified (GM) crops. When bees were released in a GM rapeseed crop, then fed the pollen to younger bees, scientists discovered the bacteria in the guts of the young ones mirrored the same genetic traits as ones found in the GM crop."
From:
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2007/03/22/are-gm-crops-killing-honeybees.aspx
We saw the Discovery and Space station go over in the night sky last night.
7:36 P.M. Pacific time. I've seen it before, but it will always b a precious memory.
I could see the poodle!! Thanks for the tip on the vegas spot.
It's really too bad those bees were killed. Surely the county Extension Agent would have known a beekeeper who could have moved them. Does Florida even have county Extension Agents? Maybe a call to the local radio stations, asking them to put out the call for a beekeeper to come move them would have worked. I really is a shame to lose a hive like that.
The reason they killed those bees is because in Florida they are starting to have a real problem with the Africanized killer bees. They are mixing with the regular honey bees and are becoming a real problem.
The exterminators are told to kill any colony they come across and I don't think they will even allow beekeepers to move them.
It's a real shame because the honey bees do so much for us.
Around the ports in Florida, they are having a lot of trouble because of them coming in the with the produce.
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