This is exactly the same shot, taken at the same instant, but this time I used the RAW file from the camera and made adjustments in Photoshop. It looks a little flat in this form, actually, but you get the point. RAW is good. RAW saves information for later fixing. Use it if your camera is capable of it. If you care about good photos for the future.

See that bare tree in front of the shed, btw? In about 7 weeks’ time, it will be a mass of white. It’s an almond tree and it bursts into flower about a week into August every year. Very nice. I’ll post a comparison photo, and if possible (weather permitting), do a time-lapse movie of it.

It will also be humming with bees, come for the flowers. I felt very bad about a news item yesterday. You may know that bees are dying out all over the world from the Varroa virus – extremely dangerous because we depend on bees for pollination.

Except in Australia. This country, so far, is free of the virus. Phew. We may be the last island with disease free bees and that has huge implications for the future.

But someone in Newcastle in NSW got into a farm and sprayed insecticide over about 150 beehives, killing millions of bees. It caused about $150,000 worth of loss, but more importantly, it wiped out an entire colony of bees. The beekeeper said it will take him at least two years to recover, and the bees used to move to Mildura during the almond blossom season in August. They can’t do that now, so we don’t know what the effect will bee (sic).

Sick is right. What kind of person would do this? It’s not the first time. Someone in Qld has been doing something similar to vege crops, spraying entire crops with pesticide or some poison. These aren’t normal humans; they’re not animals either, they are sub-human.

This madman must be found and stopped. They don’t know who did it yet, but I think he should be put into a room of bees and left to his fate. This is almost worse than murder.

Minnie slept inside last night and even now (11:30am) is inside in the warm. Quite unusual.