The broccoli flowered. I ate as much of it as I could, gave a bit away, and even drove one bunch a hundred miles up to my mom in Chino Valley (how's that for local food...)
But alas, I didn't get to it all. And now it's flowered, each of the individual green bumps that gives broccoli crowns their texture bursted open into an exuberant yellow flower. It's kind of pretty, and the bees love it.
I was a little disconcerted at first trying to take this photo. I knelt down in the middle of the patch and was still as hundreds (literally) of bees swarmed just a few inches away. Their wings brushed my face and hair and I could feel the buzzing in my teeth. One crawled up my arm for just a moment before deciding I wasn't nearly as captivating as the bright stalks waving a handsbreadth to its right.
The bees weren't interested in me. They were interested in their own unique brand of bee ecstasy, and sitting quietly in their midst I was a little overtaken by it as well. Thank you bees, for being here. I was planning to pull these in the next few days, in preparation for planting peppers and eggplant in this spot, but I think I'll keep the broccoli around a little while longer. For the bees. :)
No comments:
Post a Comment