May 26, 2006

• Pain is relative

  I was working outside today
  and noticed that some of my bees were acting a little funny. 
  Funny as in, “We are getting ready to swarm”-type behavior.  Not
  wanting to lose half the population of my strongest hive, I decided to
  do something about it.  I split the hive.  That means I went
  into the brood part of the hive and removed several frames with honey
  and with bees and eggs and brood and put them in a new hive box. 
  Hopefully they will raise themselves a queen (I saw a queen cell
  already made) and establish themselves as a productive colony. 

  I split that same hive last week for the same reason.  Unusual
  that I had to do it twice.  Last week I got in the hive and out
  without a single sting.  Today I think I got stung about 5
  times.  I wear my bee suit and it does slow them down but they can
  get that little stinger in anyway.  I notice it at the time but
  when you’re splitting a hive there’s no time to stop and worry about
  it.  Just get the job done and the hives closed up.

  The stings hurt a little but I am always amazed at how afraid people
  are of bees.  When someone hears that I have beehives the VERY
  FIRST QUESTION they always ask is, “Do you get stung much???”  My
  standard answer is this:  No, not really,  And in the 11
  years I’ve had bees, not one person besides myself has ever been stung
  by one of my bees.  None of my family or their friends or visitors
  to the farm.  So the bees really don’t go around trying to sting
  people.  After all, they die after they sting so it’s not such a
  good deal for them.

  To put it in perspective, I like to think of it this way.  I used
  to raise strawberries.  But weeding a strawberry bed is an
  endless, backbreaking job.  Picking strawberries gives you an
  incredible backache, too.  So I quit raising strawberries because
  I found it too painful.  At the moment, I have some blackberry
  bushes.  I love those huge, plump berries warmed by the sun. 
  But those bushes have the nastiest thorns known to man.  I can NOT
  pick those berries without ripping my skin or coming away without welts
  of blood.  Compared to raising strawberries or picking
  blackberries, keeping bees involves less pain! 

  And in light of the gallons of beautiful, nutritious and delicious
  honey my bees give me, why, it’s worth a few stings.  If you stop
  and think about it, many things we do in life involve risks of pain,
  even things people do for fun (paintballing for instance!).  I
  just choose to risk it with thousands of little insects.  Really,
  really cool little insects.
  

  • 9:19 pm
  • 1 Comment