Bumblebee rescue

Woke up the other day to some noisy buzzing. Thought it was another dead-rat-in-the-wall fly or I would’ve checked sooner. Later turned out to be an exhausted orange-belted bumblebee. They’re quite pretty and a little colony lives in one of the birdhouses I made so I think of them as family.

She was fagged—as we say when we’re reaching for vocabulary which might increase search engine results—and seemed done for. It takes a lot of energy to defeat the laws of ærodynamics [sic]. I put her on the porch with a few drops of water and a toothpick dipped in honey. After a few minutes of her cute little pink, forked tongue lapping up the mixture, and a bit more rest, she flew off.