I have become an apiarist (a beekeeper).  The bee on the left is a bee from one of the two colonies I purchased. 

Fascinating and industrious, the bees are enjoying the many flowers around here.  Many were checking out our gladiolus patch.  

Some more photos of our many gladiolus are available here.

Our gladiolus are have started to bloom at the farm.  We have thousands of them! Many are baby plants, but quite a few grown specimens are producing a lot of flowers in a wide variety of colours.

The bulbs were left behind by the previous owners of the farm we recently purchased.  The plants came up in what we were going to make our vegetable garden, but we decided to keep the gladiolus to see what they would do.  Very glad we did as many are very interesting varieties.  Now we need to decide where we will expand them to so the baby gladiolus plants have room to grow.

To see all the Gladiolus pictures click here

This year the Victoria Orchid Society's Orchid show was held at the Student Union Building (the sub) at UVic.  The place has changed quite a bit!  While the show was small there were still some interesting specimens, and many temptations for sale.  One day when I have a greenhouse...

Click here for the rest of the photos from the show.

The Victoria Model Airshow was held on Saturday. Models ranged from small electrics to giant gas-powered monsters spewing nicely scented smoke. In addition to the stunt planes, helicopters and interesting flying objects like the flying carpet and iron were flown.

The show was held near Michell's farm in central Saanich. The rest of the photos can be found by clicking here.

We were a little surprised at the appearance of hundreds of hot rods driving up Bear Mountain on Saturday July 28th. The appearance was due to Deuce Days NorthWest. Hundreds of hot rods, and thousands of people invaded the golf course in the biggest show of hot rods I have seen yet.

It was a great opportunity to use my wide-angle lens - the Canon 16-35mm f/2.8. The lens provided fantastic perspective and was crystal clear.

Click here for the rest of the photos.