I realised that I had again not seen the queen. Laura, Suzy's daughter, had mentioned to me during the week that I should be able to see Cleopatra quite easily, as the blue spot on her thorax is very noticeable. Therefore I can only assume that I have Nefertiti (incidentally they have now named their new queen Hatshepsut) but I just can't spot her. I am sure this is a combination of my eyesight being akin to that of a bat and also my lack of experience.
Anyway, I rather anxiously put the hive back together again and tried to estimate what I had seen. I am pretty sure that I have bees covering at least seven frames and have eggs and larvae in at least six of those. I remember seeing sealed brood on about three frames which means I should have an interesting inspection next week. My colony will have multiplied considerably, I would have thought. I am looking forward to that. I learned one major lesson today, though: keep your smoker smoking!
Many people describe beekeeping as relaxing and totally absorbing. The latter I can agree with, but the former is yet to be accomplished. I am sure it will be in time but I am still finding it pretty scary each time I enter the hive. Even so, I felt pretty pleased with myself as I left the hive, followed by about twenty bees wanting to make sure I was going.
In the afternoon, among many of my pre-Father's Day jobs, I sneaked in one of my own, to paint a couple of doors. My main target was the Man Shed door. It had obviously been painted before but it looked more than a little distressed – as if a bear had been using it as a scratching post for the last year. Therefore I went to paint it; but it was about 10 feet from the hive I had inspected only an hour earlier.
I thought an hour would be plenty of time for the bees to have calmed down but as I started painting, I got attacked; they must have remembered me. The thing about bee attacks (that does sound a little extreme, but at the time that is what it feels like) is they are rather sudden, you never know it is about to happen. Therefore, in this instant, as I had a paintbrush in one hand and a tin of paint in the other, a bee made a beeline for my ear and kept on flying at me.
A saucepan in your hand is one thing but a full tin of paint and a paintbrush is quite another. Off I went (I have a planned escape route now) but this time to dire consequences. I was desperately trying to keep the tin of paint still while waving foolishly with my other hand complete with paint-covered paintbrush. Stupidly I should have remembered that bees are attracted by movement but this all goes out of the window when you have no veil for protection! It was also pretty stupid to be waving a paintbrush around. I was covered. Paint in my hair, paint on my clothing, paint on the mangetout and pumpkins. Paint everywhere. At least my escape route worked and I was unscathed. Suffice to say, that 'man's job' can wait a while longer!
I therefore got on with building my fridge-freezer of a Beehaus. Despite there being more pieces than I initially thought, I have to say it was a joy to put together given the glorious weather. It was like constructing a Lego kit and it all slotted in place very easily.
Jo, Sebastian and I were just lazing around in the garden as I took my time over building it. A couple of cold beers were shared and the garden enjoyed. There is something about lying on the lawn on a summer's day, shoes and socks off with your toes enjoying their new-found freedom amongst the newly mown grass, and sipping an ice-cold beer. It really was bliss, though it was just slightly strange to have this sparkly Beehaus next to us. Still, once it was built, I thought it looked fantastic and couldn't wait to have it next to my traditional National hive. I will move the Beehaus into position tomorrow I think, and enjoy today for what it is. Loads of bees are flying around, incidentally. I wonder if any of them are mine.
JUNE 23
So… you can get stung in the eye.
I had always thought this was a fallacy as part of my initiation but seemingly not, as I have found out at my association training tonight.
It was the most glorious evening to be beekeeping and was my first evening at a new apiary for the Reigate Beekeepers. They have been in the process of moving to a new apiary for some time now and it was worth all the effort they have put into it. It was a stunningly beautiful sight. There are about ten hives now in total, all set out in a large circle measuring about thirty metres wide, which makes for quite a spectacle and a great training ground as there is ample space to move around. It is in the most glorious grounds surrounded by trees and meadows. There really couldn't be a better setting.
I haven't been for a couple of weeks and so it was really nice to meet up and get down to business with our regular hives. It was refreshing to deal with some calm bees. They seemed so relaxed compared to mine and it was a joy to handle them; I even considered picking one of them up but that thought quickly passed.