Without bees much life on earth would come to an end certainly we as humans would cease to exist, we owe a great debt to these most hardworking of living organisms.
Bees and their Attributes
Bees are often used by beekeepers these days to pollinate a broad range of crops planted by humans, these are crops that cannot pollinate sufficiently by themselves or disperse their pollen onto the wind in the same manner that many grasses and corn can, this is where bees come in and they have filled this specialized of pollinator role for millions of years.
Many vegetables, certain fruits, forage crops, nuts, and some cultivated plants have to avail themselves of the bees skills in this area. There are some species of plants have traits that are especially selected by cross-bredding, and have aquired the ability to self pollinate ( like some species of apple ).
Hives constructed by humans are havens for pests and diseases that can decimate a colony, (such as a paralyzing protozoan parasite that kills adult bees), and a range of bacterial diseases destroy countless numbers. There are also a number of other parasites such as the bee lice which attach themselves to the bee and feed off its body gradually weakening the helpless individuals. Bee mites are another insect that bring pain discomfort and death in great numbers to the colony.
Image left: cutting a crossection of a tree trunk to locate the Queen bee.
Colonies of (wild bees) are particularly valuable as they provide a gene pool of usually healthy uninfected honey bees. The preferred nesting site of honey bees is a cavity in an old tree, the one in the picture that I discovered was of massive proportions, nearly 20 inches across and six foot long. I found it when I was called in to safely remove a huge tree that had fallen on a house and found that the tree was also home to the magnificent wild colony pictured. I had never come across this before so I realized I needed a bee expert on the job so I called in a specialist beekeeper called and (apiarist) and followed his advice to rescue the colony rather than resorting to destroying it ( which I would have loathed ). The prime objective we had in mind was to try to rescue the hive in tact, this meant that I had to put on a special protective head garment and cut ring sections in the trunk to locate the queen bee, finally we found her and as we took her away all the other bees then gradually followed the her just as the bee expert had predicted, this was a once in a lifetime experience for me and one I will never forget. On examination the colony was found to be in a pristine and disease free condition which demonstrates that our allowing bees to exist in a truly wild and natural habitat promotes the most vigorous and the healthiest of broods.
Natural Hives are the Healthiest
We need many more old trees to be left untouched which for their part provides these bees (and other creatures such as bats and owls) with the natural accommodation and I cannot emphasise too strongly that such niches are beneficial to their health, but sadly though too many trees are cut down long before they have a chance to form the cavities and niches that they live in.
Language of Bees
The communication skills of bees has long been recognized as an awesome spectacle considering that they are such a tiny seemingly insignificant little insect yet on observation they are quite adept at specifying exactly where the pollen rich flowers are to be found by means of a dance!.
When a foraging bee returns to the hive with the nectar and pollen consignment it becomes very excited and goes into a kind of circular dance routine then the other bees gather round as it conveys the information as to the exact distance and compass direction of the nectar source relative to the position of the sun at that time, this is often achieved by subtle variations in the style of the dance. The successful bee may not only dance in circular style but also use variations on a figure of eight sequences. To my surprise there are actually trained apiarists around who can tell from observing the style of the bees waggle dance exactly where the nectar source is, how remarkable, if only we humans could understood the communications of other animals half as well the might sit up and take more notice of their plight, perhaps one day we will!.
Image above left: a healthy colony is located
Taking the Queen away.
The image left was taken after we had extracted the comb containing the queen, the other bees rallied around the queen and then went quietly along with her. The bee expert (apiarist ) under whose direction I worked was more than pleased not only to have secured a prime colony, but both he and I were very grateful that together we had helped to save what was a very healthy but doomed colony of thousands of little fellow beings.
If we provide these worthy creatures with more of their natural living conditions it will mean that we may have to forgo the availability of our tasty nutritious honey, but what a small price to pay in behalf of our magnificent, highly intelligent and of course vital insect friends.
Image left: Wild honeycomb.
