As mentioned earlier Spirit Hills makes beautiful mead with honey. In order to get all the delicious organic honey needed, they manage a lot of bee hives. I got to help out Hugo with the bees over our stay (thanks Hugo!). And as a result bees have been on my mind a lot lately. They say that the drone of bees can create a trance like state, which would explain why hours in the bee yards seemed to pass so quickly. But this doesn’t totally explain why people get so into bees, demonstrated by the disproportionate amount of art they inspire (this 80’s pop classic being just one good example, and here is a list of all fictional bees!).
I think part of the appeal of bees is that we have so much to learn from these lil guys. Understandably, many people think the Queen bee runs a strict dictatorial system of government. But while I was at Spirit Hills I got to read a great book called Honeybee Democracy. In it super bee nerd Dr T. Seeley demonstrates that when it comes to key decisions the hive operates as a democracy. For example an idea for the hive to relocate will be considered by the other bees, and if enough bees like the sound of the idea, the move is made. I kind of want to try and draw some parallels between the bee’s form of democracy and that of Australia, with its legally entrenched and largely symbolic monarch combined with a very democratic form of government. But I think that could get messy…
So just quickly, other cool bee facts I have learned include the role of the Drone bee (the males). Drone bees purpose in life is to try and have sex with a Queen bee. This is unlikely, as each Queen goes on one maiden flight at the start of her life in which she mates with several bees, amassing a collection of thousands of sperm which she stores in a sac, and uses for the next few years to fertilise the eggs she lays. If a Drone is lucky enough to get lucky with a Queen, his penis explodes from the experience and he dies instantly, dropping from the place of their passion 30m above the ground. If he is not so ‘lucky’, he sits around in the hive all summer just eating and drinking and getting in the way, and then the Worker bees (females) drag him out of the hive and block his return so he will die in the cold of winter…. As I said a lot to learn!
Clearly I am wigging out about bees. Which is why I will leave my final bee fact (for now) being that bees are in danger. This is a serious problem. Einstein is quoted as saying that if the bees all died humans would survive for only four years. I don’t know what this stat is based on, but c’mon, he was a pretty sharp dude. So basically the way bees are dying en masse around the world is something worth thinking about. People are not certain why this is happening, but it is argued that pesticides and Genetically Modified Organisim’s have played a part in screwing with the bees beautiful and finely tuned way of life. It is such a sad example of the way humans can destroy the most beautiful things they depend on… a lot to learn indeed. DV
the sociable weavers 