Forensic Beekeeping...Meanwhile the S.W.A.T. Team's on Standby...

Finally--my tiller is up and running, and I'm playing catchup with the spring turning. I'm thankful to have my hands now guiding a machine instead of handling the shovel to turn the soil as I had to do in the sweet pea patch. It seems just as one problem is solved here on our one slim acre, another is sure to take its place. Is that what's called "karma?"

I'm tilling away on a warm afternoon when I'm suddenly confronted by a rogue honeybee. This pugnacious little lady was not about to practice social distancing, either. She was in my face, up close and personal, ricocheting off my ball cap, right there under my nose. When one is operating a machine that might, if he's not careful, grind up one foot...or both, distractions are not a good thing. Now this beekeeper has been around the block a time or two and a rogue bee is nothing new. Sometimes I deal with the cantankerous bee mano a mano. (An error, perhaps, as the opponent is female.) "Ok, then, let's have it out. Give me your best shot." And I back up against a shrub, tree, or the woodpile to protect my posterior against sneak attacks. We go at it then, my ballcap my weapon and you know what hers is. I usually swat my way into the winner's circle by knocking her to the ground and stomping her, but sometimes she slips through and scores a direct hit. And that is the end of it usually.

Usually. But not always. Once in a while an entire hive will turn rogue on you, and instead of contending with just one malcontent, you'll suddenly be under siege by a half dozen or more. Then it's either retreat or finish your outside chores wearing your bee veil. (If you've ever tried gardening while wearing a veil, you'll know how that works.) Mother Nature works in mysterious ways and for some reason a honeybee queen's genetics set the temperament of a hive. In an earlier post I referenced what beekeepers refer to as a "hot" hive (The wicked queen is dead). The solution is to remove that queen's wayward genetics from the rest of the crew and replace her with milder, gentler royalty. By the time the new queen's first brood cycle is complete, the hive has taken on a more amenable personality.

If a beekeeper does routine inspections of his "flock," he's certainly aware which hive, if any, is a hot one. A hive of such ilk makes no attempt to mask its nastiness. A beekeeper and his charges must coexist peacefully. I'm not the only one who lives on our one slim acre and there is the occasional visitor. In short, who's to be master of the place: me or the bees?

The rogue bee has brought reinforcements twice during my tiller sessions. I took out a couple but there are so, so many more; they'd just keep on coming. The problem is I've been working my bee yard all spring and the ladies and I have gotten along just swimmingly. Now, for some reason, the dynamics have changed and I asked myself why? Mine is a low budget enterprise: I can't afford to hire a PI to look into the issue and have to sort through it myself: DIY forensic beekeeping, if you will. So what's changed, I ask:

1. I haven't operated the tiller this spring until recently; the machine appears to incite them.
2. I have new bees on the place, one three pound package and their new queen.
3. Two additional queens, also, in two nucleus hives I've added to the yard.
4. All the colonies have ramped up their populations: many, many more bees on the place.

I fired up the tiller on a cool, cloudy day and the bees left me alone. Understandable as weather like that few foragers venture out. But summer is coming and with it warmer, cloudless days...and I'm not about to till in the dead of night. So while I figure things out, I guess I'll have to call in the S.W.A.T. team: just me and my ball cap.






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