'Crusher' gets her comeuppance

M and R flew in faster than a MiG fighter jet formation this afternoon; which had me scrabbling into my bee suit, running for my half-prepared smoker, hopping into my squelchy wellies (yes, they sprung a leak in yesterday's flash flood - see here) and tracking mud from the garden all over the carpets, which Guy (in an extravagance of boredom) had vacuumed scrupulously all week. Oh dear!

All the activity, naturally, left me perspiring freely in the humid summer heat. I could feel beads of sweat crawling down to the tip of my nose where it met the mesh of my veiled suit. Not an auspicious start to the proceedings, one must admit.

If my neighbours didn't know before that there was a beekeeper in the vicinity, they sure do now. A veritable army of "Men in White" marched down to the hive through clouds of ominous smoke, coughing ever so slightly as I puffed away in a steam of over-enthusiasm. The hive in question has been looming ever so slightly out at me all week, as I've careened between horrific thoughts of disease, Bee Inspectors with blowtorches, digging 1m trenches, dowsing bees in petrol and gigantic flames destroying all my dreams, and swinging back into fantasies of winning the National Honey Show with my prime-flavoured honey (labels to read "London Garden Honey" of course).













In the Clover




These bees have been the best thing in my garden in four years, and it would absolutely break my heart if there was disease in them, this early in my bee-farming venture. I realise though that I'm new to the whole thing, and have been very carefully prepped about the dangers of disease, and therefore completely likely to over-react. Never mind of course, my completely understated ability to over-state the obvious and embellish every event into Melodrama of the Highest Order. Possibly not the best qualities for a beekeeper ...

We smoked the hive and popped the top off. The crownboard came off, and the hive was absolutely filled to the brim with bees, comb, heat and activity. I cannot believe how much work these bees have done in the 4 short weeks they've been here. But then, so little time and so much still to do!

M and R were great, standing back to let me go through the frames on my own. The instant they spotted the dark grey cells I've been worried about, they reassured me "dark pollen - no worries". The fact that so many different colours can appear in a hive gives me some idea of just how much I still have to learn; how much there is to know. I remember seeing, last week, drops of acid-bright green and purple (purple!?) on the frames, and wondering to myself "what on earth?!" But yes, hives are not a monochromatic multitude of cells; the organic array of colours and shapes really needs a sharp eye, and experience, to understand and interpret what's been happening in the secret lives of bees.

So we worked our way through the frames; the central ones are now becoming incredibly heavy. They are filled, filled, filled to the brim with tiny rice-grain eggs, larvae, capped brood and honey stores. There were tons more bees than before - definitely a whole batch of babies have been born and are already busy working away.

As we worked, the bees got crosser and crosser. Whereas earlier, M mentioned how gentle they seemed, now they started rising high out of the hive and humming rather loudly. And right then, I got my comeuppance for crushing all those little lady bees. They got me, one on my left hand, one on the right - right through the rubber gloves. I rubbed the stings away, but started to get a bit freaked so I walked right away from the hive out to the garden. Man, did those stings burn!

Right now, the backs of my hands look a little lumpy, but the worst is over and a mere ache remains. It seems I will truly be testing the theory this season; to see if it really is true that the beekeeper who is stung by her own bees, and then eats the produce of the bees' efforts, becomes immune to hayfever.

And the best news of all? "Go on," says R, "put on a Queen Excluder and a Super, and let's see if you can get some honey." Yahooooo!

So the plan is to watch the Queen's activities carefully from now on; watch and make sure she has enough space to keep laying in the Brood Box. The super will allow the bees to use space other than the Brood Box to store food supplies; nectar and honey. If we can take some honey from the Super, we'll put the Super back with the same frames (once the honey has been removed) and create the Brood and a Half they will need.

Another lesson today was; shouldn't have destroyed that perfect Queen cell I saw - we need one, uncapped, for Supercedure (must remember to look that bit up again). And more, keep reading on pollens and pollen colours.

It has been such a pleasure knowing that I have friends in such far away places as Dubai, and Johannesburg and as exotic as Wimbledon and Kent, watching and worrying with me about the fate of the bees. The good news is, folks, they're fine, happy, safe and disease-free as far as we can tell. Now all I have to do is make sure I don't trip over my own two feet on the next visit to the hive.

Better than Coronation Street, innit!? :-D

Brood Box with Super on top
- the thin yellow line between the two is the Queen Excluder)