From A to Bee (38 page)

  Forgot to mention: despite the message I left yesterday for the bee inspector, it seems that he actually turned up to meet me. He called to say that he got my message too late and had already arrived at our house. That is surely going to count against me when we do finally get a chance to meet up. He agreed to pop back in a couple of weeks but I feel pretty bad about making him come all the way out to see me again.

I spoke to a few of the beekeepers at the association today and explained my predicament. It seems that almost everybody has now extracted their honey and is enjoying the fruits of their labour. Many have been saying that it has been the best flow of honey for years. They all said that getting a jar or two in that first year is always a difficult affair, but starting as late as I did would make it practically impossible. This just confirmed what I feared all that time ago but was probably not willing to admit.

  A few were understandably sceptical of my motivations of trying to get a jar of honey and thought I was mad to go running around the country on the search. However, there were others who could see what I was trying to do and some suggested that I take a little bit from the brood stores. After all, if it was just enough honey for one small jar then it shouldn't affect the bees too much, especially if I planned to feed them as well. I had never considered this before but it gave me a viable backup plan. I wasn't particularly keen, but they had plenty of stores in the hive based on the inspection at the weekend so maybe, just maybe.

  Originally I was planning for a nice large jar of honey to put on the breakfast table but now I'm thinking about altering this plan. If there is not enough honey in the super and I take some from the brood box, I don't really want to take too much after all. I was given two of the smallest glass jars by Omlet as some of the freebies that came with the Beehaus. These weren't quite on a par with those tiny plastic jam or honey capsules you get in a hotel but they weren't an awful lot bigger. As they are glass, I am sure I could get away with calling these a jar. Perfect: my standards have lowered to an achievable aim and I wouldn't be affecting the bees too much.

I made the decision to leave the hive at the Devil's Punch Bowl for a little while longer as I would like to give them the opportunity to take on as much of the heather as possible, so I had only the Beehaus to check today.

  I didn't see the queen but I did see that she had been laying recently, which was encouraging. There was one thing within the inspection that truly astounded me however; the 'waggle dance'. Now I have been doing plenty of inspections since I started back in June but I had yet to see a waggle dance at full throttle. It was fascinating. I thought originally that they just did a waggle and then disappeared to get on with other duties. Seeing a bee doing a waggle dance in a particular area and then moving across the frame a little to do it elsewhere, to then move again was really interesting to see. It probably explains how information can travel so fast through the hive. These magical little messengers were simply mesmerising to look at as they spread their good news.

  When I was watching this amazing dance I was struck by the thought that I hadn't used a lot of smoke on this inspection. Maybe I had been smoking them too much previously and it was probably like dancing through the smog-filled backstreets of London during the 1950s. They must have given up, thinking that the darkness is bad enough, let alone this smoke stuff.

  Regardless, it was lovely to see this dance for the first time in my own hive and not on a video of someone else's. Yet again I was reminded of how amazing they are.

Something quite unexpected happened today. I have mentioned before that I live on a farm track. The farm at the bottom is owned by a gentleman by the name of Steve, a quite elusive character who keeps himself to himself. In fact, other than wave at him as he drives by our house, I have never really set eyes on him.

  From what I have heard from others, he isn't the nicest of characters and certainly he doesn't get on with Farmer Ray who lives opposite. Let's just say there is a lot of historical politics going on which has got quite unpleasant from what I can understand. So I was quite wary of meeting Steve, who by profession is actually a carpenter and had now turned his hand to farming. Imagine my surprise, therefore, when his car pulled up next to me as I was walking down the track.

  His big black van with tinted windows drew to a halt and the windows rolled down to expose a slightly gaunt face with aviator-style sunglasses. He must have been in his fifties and it looked like he hadn't had the easiest of lives. I am not sure how I can describe the greeting but it was certainly abrupt, and the entire conversation went like this:

  Steve: 'You're the beekeeper fella, aren't you?'

  Me: 'Yep, that's me, I just started this year and have a couple of hives, one is actually elsewh–' He cut me off.

  Steve: 'Good, I have several thousand apple, pear and cherry trees up there at the farm. If you want to put your hives there feel free. I asked the beekeeping association before but no one returned my call.'

  Me: 'Wow, that sounds amazing, yes, thank you. I am moving my hive back this weekend actually. Would it be OK to mo–' He cut me off again.

  Steve: 'The code is 1897 for the lock, make sure you lock it up behind you, I am having a problem with gypsies at the moment.'

  Before I could even say thank you and goodbye the window was being rolled up and he was accelerating at speed away from my standing position in a cloud of dust. I couldn't really work out what had just happened. Not only did he appear to confirm what most people had said about him in that he was rather curt and to the point, but he had also offered me an opportunity which was just unreal.

  Most beekeepers dream of a site like this, wherever it may be, let alone just up the road. I couldn't believe my luck but, if truth be told, I also couldn't believe that I had never seen this orchard previously; it sounded huge. I had to get up there before I went to collect the hive.

I am trying to do lots of reading about how to get the bees ready for winter which I understand to be a combination of disease prevention and feeding. Aside from lots of finger crossing from the beekeeper, the bees need stores which they can call upon in the darkest depths of winter until the spring comes along once more. Apparently one of the most nerve wracking moments for beekeepers is during the warmer days in spring when they look for activity around the hives. This will tell them whether their hives have survived the winter as you very rarely check them when the weather is cold.

  There's not much else I can do at the moment, but it's going to start getting busy over the next few days as I prepare to extract some honey, whether from the super or the brood box, and move the hive back home again. However, this time I am moving them back to paradise. An orchard! What a lovely surprise that will be for them as they fly out the next morning… Actually, that is probably a lie as they are simply trees at the moment with no blossom. It's nice to think, though, that they will fly out, look at the trees, instantly recognise what they are and decide that this winter will be worth sticking out because spring will be a fantastic time with lots of blossom to be had.

  Before going to get the hive tomorrow I wanted to go and have a look at where I was going to put the hive. I have never been near Steve's actual house before as it is rather imposing and the two great big Rottweilers outside, looking like they would eat my arm off should I even look at them, never gave me a good enough reason to go and say hello.

  Therefore I got in the car, Sebastian by my side (thinking along the lines that if a man wouldn't hit another wearing glasses, dogs wouldn't eat an 'intruder' with a child) to make the small trip up to Steve's farm. I arrived and it was immediately apparent as I helped Sebastian out of the car that no one was there, not even the Rottweilers. The huge house, complete with now run-down outbuildings, was deserted in a rather eerie way. It must have been a huge operation at one point and from what I hear from Farmer Ray, it used to be a dairy farm; this may be where some of the confrontation lay, as it used to be Farmer Ray's home where he grew up. Now these outbuildings were all in terrible disrepair with fallen-in roofs, some of them covered in ivy. There were sounds similar to those you hear in Westerns or when you see disused airports in a desert and random mechanical sounds reverberate in the background. It really felt quite uncomfortable.

  I crept up to what I thought was their front door and peered through the glass windows to see if I could see any signs of life. WOOF, WOOF, WOOF!! The two Rottweilers leaped up at the door with snarling teeth, snapping in front of me. As I jumped out of my skin, Sebastian, on top of my shoulders at this point, simply went, 'Hello doggy, nice to see you doggy.'

  Having quickly left without so much as a 'Goodbye doggies', Sebastian and I went for a walk through the orchard. Most of it was behind the house, hence why I had never seen it before, but some of it touched the road where a huge embankment had blocked our view previously. It was like heaven, rows upon rows of beautiful fruit trees, probably planted three or four years ago looking at their size. There must have been at least a thousand of them and Sebastian and I just kept walking around looking at this wondrous sight. I cannot imagine how magnificent this must look in spring with all the blossom: it must be a sight to behold.

  As we continued walking we came across two slightly smaller orchards, again filled with fruit trees, evidently planted at a similar time. It was just beautiful and I left satisfied, though a little bit worried about how this was going to pan out. I didn't know where Steve wanted me to put this hive therefore I rang him on his mobile and found he was in the pub. He said to pop up a little later, at about 8 p.m., and he would show me where he thought it would work best.