Orren Fox - Do Beekeeping: The Secret to Happy Honeybees

Published by The Do Book Company 2015
Works in Progress Publishing Ltd
thedobook.co

Text Orren Fox 2015
Photography Michael Piazza, except
p12, 52, 61, 62, 71, 130 Libby Delana
p66, 72, 76, 110, 112 Jonathan Cherry
p117 Patricia Niven
p99, 100 Anna Koska
Illustrations Anna Koska 2014

The right of Orren Fox to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

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eISBN 978-1-907974-21-2
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

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There are certain pursuits which, if not wholly poetic and true, do at least suggest a nobler and finer relation to nature than we know. The keeping of bees, for instance. Henry David Thoreau

For the beekeepers at Kopila Valley School and to Duke

Contents

Introduction

I opened the car door, walked to the back and opened the trunk, out of which I grabbed my bee suit, gloves and toolbox. After shutting the trunk, I began to make my way towards the hives. It was a warm, pleasant, late August afternoon. I glanced around as I walked, enjoying the little grove of trees where my bees live. It was rather humid and very buggy, so I put down my tools and stepped into my suit. I lazily tossed my veil onto my head to keep the bugs away, but didnt zip my suit because of the heat. On my feet, I was wearing a pair of flip-flops a risky yet conscious decision. It was rare for me to get stung on my feet, so with this in mind, I opted for the ease of flip-flops rather than sneakers for today.

As I approached the hives, I noticed that the bees were incredibly active something I had come to expect on a hot summers day. Hundreds of them were coming and going from each hive every second. The apparent chaos at the front of each hive belied the fact that each and every bee knew exactly where it was going and what it was doing. Being a human, I found it hard to fully appreciate the organisation at work in front of me.

After making a quick observation, I zipped my suit, grabbed the necessary tools and headed over to the hives. As I walked nearer, their buzzing got louder. I watched as bees came and went, the sun illuminating their backs. As I prised the lid off the first hive, countless bees surged out and came crashing into my veil. Its an odd feeling to have hundreds of little insects greet me with such enthusiasm but one I have now become accustomed to.

The aromas of this first hive were both sweet and quite savoury. Its a smell that can only be found in a freshly opened hive, nowhere else. Once the delicious aroma faded, I started to check up on things, pulling out a few frames in order to get a sense of how the hive was doing. As I worked, I was relieved to see that this one seemed to be coming on quite well. The queen had been laying many eggs, the baby bees known as brood were abundant, and there was a vast amount of honey and pollen. And the hive was not overly aggressive, which came as a relief.

Of all the experiences Ive had with bees, its ones like these that give me most pleasure. Although the primary goal of visiting my bees is to observe the health of the hive, my underlying aim is merely to enjoy the moment. Beekeeping is unlike any other activity. While it can have its downsides, overall it is an extremely positive experience. Its hard to replicate the feeling of bottling your first jar of honey, or the moment when you realise your hive has survived the winter. Both are extremely gratifying and go some way to explain why I keep bees. Throughout the rest of this book, I hope you will learn more about these fascinating creatures and find your own reasons as to why and how you too should keep bees.

Bee Basics

Concerning the generation of animals akin to them, as hornets and wasps, the facts in all cases are similar to a certain extent, but are devoid of the extraordinary features which characterise bees; this we should expect, for they have nothing divine about them as the bees have.
Aristotle

The humble honeybee has played a significant role in human history. Depictions of honeybees can be found in cave art created by some of the earliest civilisations. Although our ancestors were not keeping bees at this time, they were still benefiting from one of the bees many services: the creation of honey.

Beekeeping didnt become commercially viable i.e. where the hive and bees no longer had to be destroyed to harvest the honey until the 19th century and the invention of the movable comb hive, but humans had kept their own bees long before that. Some of the earliest indicators come from the tombs of ancient Egypt. Honey has been discovered inside these tombs and, perhaps even more impressive, the honey had not degraded! This is one of the amazing qualities about honey it doesnt go bad. In both a literal and figurative sense, honey is timeless.

Over time, the honeybees role in society has changed and evolved. Beekeeping is no longer mainly a hobby: it has, like so much agriculture, become industrialised. For the purposes of this book, well be keeping things on a small scale.

Hive Hierarchy

A hive of honeybees is a complex unit. It consists mainly of worker bees, all of which are female. There is also a group of drones, the males in the hive, vastly outnumbered by the female workers. Finally, there is the one and only queen, the mother of the hive.

One single hive of honeybees can have as many as 100,000 bees or as few as 15,000 of which only 500 to 700 might be drones. The reason why there are so few drones is simple: they do not work. The drones only task is to mate with the queen, and that only happens once in her life. After they have done this, the drones do nothing other than eat copious amounts of honey and pollen.

As the worker bees go through their life cycle of approximately 35 days, their role changes. When a worker is born, her first task is to clean out the cell where she was incubated. After this, she remains in the hive as a nurse bee feeding the brood or as one of the queens many faithful followers. When the worker bee grows older, she becomes a forager. Every day she will fly out of the hive in search of nectar and pollen.

The queen is rather easy to find in a hive due to her size. She is significantly larger than the workers and drones, nearly twice the size. Stil, some beekeepers often put a spot of paint on the queen so she can be easily identified. The drones are bigger than the workers, but not as majestic in size and stature as the queen. Regardless, all bees are important, and each has a crucial role in the success of the hive.

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