I had to be quite patient to get these shots and take multiple exposures. Then I had to wait all afternoon and evening and half the night to work with them. Still, they were worth the wait. These have been sharpened and cropped a fair bit to get them to look detailed at this size. Larger images, of course, would be more impressive.

In a related note, the other day I was musing at how odd the Urdu word for “bee” seemed to me. It is “shahed ki muhki,” which literally means “fly of the honey.” I thought it odd to call bees flies. I think that no longer. These images show bees to be remarkably like large flies, albeit with stingers and the ability to industriously gather pollen on their hind legs.

The last shot is not great, but I could not resist posting a face to face shot with a wee, flying bee. Let’s call him Bertie. Enjoy.

P.S. I did feel a little like the “bear with very little brain” as I waited for some of these shots with bees buzzing around my head. If it were not such a lovely day, I might have tried saying “Tut, tut. It looks like rain!”