Today was the second day of sunny weather with temperatures getting into the mid 60s (F) in my area south of Portland. This is about 10 degrees above normal for March.
My wife and I were out walking our younger granddog when we encountered a surprise. In a greenspace at the edge of a parking lot of an office building about 2 miles away from my house, we saw a honey bee hive.
I recognized it immediately from its distinct shape (having looked at many pictures for the Save the Bees challenge 
). When we approached it I saw a lot of activity in the front landing area of the hive. Apparently, there is a local project going on to place solitary honey bee hives around the community. There are a lot of blackberry bushes in this greenspace which is adjacent to a large pond - we'll see if we get a bumper crop this summer.
I'll need to be on the lookout for more of these hives.
