Recently my wife found an old book from the 1950’s with some super great illustrations. Most are very simple black line drawings with one or two colors. One that really caught my eye is a small illustration of several bees. The picture inspired me to do something with bees, so I got out a magnifier (the illustration is tiny!) and got to drawing.  I ended up with three bees in ink, on top of acrylic, and various notes in pencil and pen.

While drawing I was reminded of my Great Uncle who is an entomologist specializing in bees. I decided to google him to see what turned up.  I found a paper titled: Automictic Parthenogenesis in the Honey Bee.  Absolutely fascinating!  I really didn’t know much about his work at all.  Drawing the bees and reading some of his work has me wishing to know him better.  Next on my list is to write him a letter.

Something else I’m curious about now is urban beekeeping.  Here is a great TED talk about it from Noah Wilson-Rich, in case you are interested.  One of the things he talks about is vaccinating bees.  Seriously.  Amazing.