July is probably the best month to visit South Central Alaska. Most of the mosquitoes are gone, weather is great (usually sunny, 60-80 during the day), flowers are growing in abundance. Sunlight tops 20 hours, so I sleep with an eye mask.
This year, though, our summer was unusually rainy (which benefited the berries but brought slugs to the gardens) and yellow jackets were unusually abundant. We found hives under the front porch, in the greenhouse, and even in boots hung upside down outside the guest cabin. In August, they attacked our bee hives, and we think may have moved into one hive abandoned by a colony that swarmed (departed), leaving too small a group to defend itself from the aggressive predators. Bryan duct taped the entrance and ventilation holes to suffocate the wasps. Fortunately, because the two hives were so large and productive, he harvested the honey in several tranches in July and August, thus depriving the wasps of many gallons of that golden nectar.
