Seeking wisdom from the ferns
[ As we walked, we could see the bees waking up. ]
TALES OF THE FERNFOLK
Animals
A Morning with Beekepers Mary & Seamus
"The flower doesn't dream of the bee. It blossoms and the bee comes."
The Honey Whisperer
The tape recorder clicked on, capturing the steady, low hum of eighty thousand insects.
"Just ignore the ones landing on your collar," Barnaby Buzzwell said. He didn't look up from his hive tool. "They smell the fear. It reminds them of bears." The young journalist, clutching his notepad like a shield, swallowed hard. "Barnaby, you've run this apiary for forty years. How does one begin to understand a colony?"
Barnaby carefully lifted a wooden frame, entirely coated in a shifting blanket of golden bodies. "You don't understand them. You negotiate with them. Every morning, I walk out here and assess the mood. Some days they are joyful. Some days they are angry about the humidity. Last Tuesday, they were deeply offended by my choice of laundry detergent."
"And how do they express that offense?" the journalist asked, flinching as a worker bee zipped past his ear. "They perform what I call the 'bonk,'" Barnaby explained, scraping away a bit of excess wax. "They fly directly into your forehead at top speed. It is a warning shot. If you ignore the bonk, the stings follow."
The journalist scribbled frantically. "Is it true you don't wear a protective suit?" "Suits are for lawyers," Barnaby chuckled, his weathered face wrinkling. "The bees know my face. They know my scent. If I wear a giant white canvas marshmallow suit, I look like an alien invader. Trust is built skin-to-wing."
He pointed a thick, sticky finger toward the center of the frame. "Look there. That's Beatrice. She's a scout. She just spent twenty minutes doing a figure-eight dance to tell the hive about a fresh patch of clover near the highway."
"And how do they express that offense?" the journalist asked, flinching as a worker bee zipped past his ear. "They perform what I call the 'bonk,'" Barnaby explained, scraping away a bit of excess wax. "They fly directly into your forehead at top speed. It is a warning shot. If you ignore the bonk, the stings follow."
The journalist scribbled frantically. "Is it true you don't wear a protective suit?" "Suits are for lawyers," Barnaby chuckled, his weathered face wrinkling. "The bees know my face. They know my scent. If I wear a giant white canvas marshmallow suit, I look like an alien invader. Trust is built skin-to-wing."
He pointed a thick, sticky finger toward the center of the frame. "Look there. That's Beatrice. She's a scout. She just spent twenty minutes doing a figure-eight dance to tell the hive about a fresh patch of clover near the highway."