Bee Hill: Before

Rain has been sporadic this summer. Mark had taken his tractor and used the disc to break up the ground, but the rain had made a mess. Rather than disc the gigantic clods again, he got seed in the ground so he could put his custom-built hive stands out. In this photo, he's driving a post into the ground. Why? Because he's OCD, and he had to run a plumb line so the stands were all perfectly even. He measured the spaces in between so the bees all had the recommended distance from each other, and then we leveled four stands.
Now, this bucolic view to the left does not reveal the truth. When I took this photo, it was noon on a Saturday. In Mississippi. In the summer. Which meant it was "hotter than the hammered hinges of Hades" as a friend of mine says. Normal people would have waited until it was cooler, and then not spent a bunch of time measuring everything. But, we never claimed to be normal.

After what felt like forever during which time I drove the 4-wheeler back to the house for supplies including more ice water, we were done. Bee Hill was ready for business.