There are lots of bumble bees about around here just now, trying to make the most out of the rhododendrons. However, some of them also seem to be looking for I'm-not-sure-what - and in really unlikely places...
The photo below is AI generated, but a surprisingly good reconstruction of what I found yesterday morning when I came to raise the venetian blinds in my kitchen window.
What I may not have quite succeeded in explaining to AI is that my blinds sit inside triple-glazed windows. Even so - yesterday morning, underneath the bottom of the blinds, there was a bumble bee lying completely still on its back. After I had raised the blind it was still lying there, in the same position, trapped between the outer and inner glass panes. So I was convinced it was dead. How on earth it had managed to get in there still goes beyond my understanding. That window had not been opened in weeks, and even if I open it, the window frame is held together by two 'latches' that I need tools to open. The last time I washed that window was when I put up my new curtains a couple of months ago - but then I only washed the outside and the inside, without taking it apart. Where the bumble bee managed to find an entry in between the glass panes from outside remains a mystery. (Not to mention the question why it would even get the idea to try!)
Anyway... It bothered me to have a dead body inside my window, so I found a tool and managed to get the window frame apart...
... And then I possibly gave a scream (at least internally!), because the dead body suddenly started to wave its legs about...
In the midst of shock, I temporarily forgot all about what I recently read on Janice's blog about First Aid for weak bees, and just went ahead with my original plan - which was to gently lift the body bee with a piece of paper and throw it back out from where it must originally (somehow!) have come...
However, right down below that window there are rhododendron in bloom. So if it was able to crawl about at all, hopefully it was also able to find its own nourishment. And if not - well, at least it got an adventurous life, and a half decent burial...
Kitchen window with venetian blinds raised.
"An adventure always has an element of the unknown.
Being adventurous means you're willing to go
where you haven't been before and do things
you've never done, even if you don't know
how it's going to turn out."
(Vocabulary.com)
Being adventurous means you're willing to go
where you haven't been before and do things
you've never done, even if you don't know
how it's going to turn out."
(Vocabulary.com)
I probably say at least once when starting on a trip with others (even if just for an hour) "this is going to be such a great adventure!" So glad Ms. Bumble was saved by you...and I'll imagine she's off enjoying her life with Rhododendron nectar! I noticed a dead bee that's become petrified in the back window of my car the other day...a place I seldom look unless going into the trunk. I need to remove it soon!
ReplyDeleteBarbara, I prefer to imagine her a survivor, too! :)
DeleteIt was probably drunk with nectar.
ReplyDeleteNorthsider, that still doesn't explain how it got inside my triple-glazed window...
DeleteI hope he lived!!! As usual, I ALWAYS love your cute curtains!!! I never see any I like as well on Amazon.
ReplyDeleteThanks Ginny, so do I (hope it survived). I've never bought curtains without seeing them (and feeling them) "live" in a store. These were made for a Swedish chain of stores, Rusta. (No doubt produced in Asia, though.) Besides Sweden they have stores in Norway, Finland and Germany. But not in the US.
DeleteYour unexpected guest certainly had a flair for drama and adventure; here’s hoping it found its way to the rhododendrons for a well-earned rest and recharge
ReplyDeleteThanks Ro. :)
DeleteShe must have entered from the outside, no doubt; the tiniest hole or crack in the window frame - or above/around it in the wall of a building - will be enough. And the reason why bees and bumble bees (and wasps, too, even hornets) do that is simple: They look for a nesting place. Many species of (wild) bees and bumble bees do not build big hives like our common "honey bee", but they lead solitare lives with just a tiny hollow needed where they can place a few eggs. Therefore, they carefully inspect places such as window frames, the space behind or above blinds, and so on. If a food source is nearby, such as the rhododendron around your building, all the better.
ReplyDeleteI am glad this one was still alive after all!
Meike, it seems to me that the inside of a window with a built-in death-trap (a venetian blind going up and down every day) would be very far from an ideal nesting place... (lol)
DeleteWhat a shock, but pleasing after the initial reaction!
ReplyDeleteJanice, while I was really puzzled by the incident, I suppose the shock to the bee must have been worse!
Delete