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Archive for the ‘Bee Lore’ Category

Bee Wars!

Posted in Bee Lore on November 13, 2007| Leave a Comment »

Over the centuries, bees have been used many times as weapons of war. In the thirteen century, residents of the Aegean island of Astipalaia hurled beehives onto pirates storming the castle gates. During World War 1, Belgians trapped in an apiary used bees against the Germans.

Honey, too, has been used as a weapon. Certain members of the heath family produce grayanotoxins, chemicals that act as breathing inhibitors and hypnotics. Honey from these plants is referred to as toxic or “mad ” honey. Three squadrons of Pompey’s Roman troops were slain while under the influence of toxic honey provided by local tribesmen. In small amounts, toxic honey has been used in alcohol, as an additive to increase its punch, and in medicine.

 From: http://casswww.ucsd.edu/personal/ron/CVNC/byline/bugs_96mar.html

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Breaking the Law of Aerodynamics

Posted in Bee Law, Bee Lore, Bee Present, Bee-ology on November 11, 2007| Leave a Comment »

Aerodynamically, the bumble bee shouldn’t be able to fly, but the bumble bee doesn’t know (the laws of aerodynamics), so it goes on flying anyway!

After Mary Kay Ash American businesswoman who founded Mary Kay Cosmetics (1963). b.1915

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She Labours for Others

Posted in Bee Lore, Bee Present on November 11, 2007| Leave a Comment »

The bee is more honored than other animals, not because she labours, but because she labours for others.

Saint John Chrysostom. Archbishop of Constantinople, 347-407

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Was You Ever Bit by a Dead Bee?

Posted in Bee Lore, Bee Present, Bee-ology, Beekeeping, Beetwixt & Beetween on November 9, 2007| 1 Comment »

Eddie: Say, was you ever bit by a dead bee?
Beauclerc: I have no memory of ever being bitten by any kind of bee.
Slim: Were you?
Eddie: You’re all right lady. You and Harry’s the only one that ever—
Harry: Don’t forget Frenchy.
Eddie: That’s right. You and Harry and Frenchy. You know you gotta be careful of dead bees, if you go around barefooted. Cause if you step on ‘em they can sting ya just as bad as if they was alive, especially is they was kinda mad when they got killed. I bet I been bit a hundred times that way.
Slim: You have. Why don’t you bite them back?
Eddie: That’s what Harry always says. But I ain’t got no stinger.

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From: “To Have and Have Not” (1944). 

By: Jules Furthman (1888–1960), U.S. screenwriter, William Faulkner (1897–1962), U.S. author, screenwriter, and Howard Hawks.

With: Eddie (Walter Brennan), Beauclerc (Paul Marion), Slim/Marie Brown (Lauren Bacall), Harry Morgan (Humphrey Bogart)

By answering Eddie’s nonsensical question correctly, Slim earns entree into Harry’s and Eddie’s tight-knit group.

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I once met a beekeeper who said it was possible to inject sufferers of arthritis with stings from dead bees to help ease the ailment.  However, I have never tried it!  Odd as it seems, dead bees can sting you – particularly if , like Eddie, you tread on hundreds of them with bare feet!

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The End of a Bee’s Life

Posted in Bee Law, Bee Lore, Bee Present, Bee-ology, Beekeeping, Beetwixt & Beetween on October 19, 2007| Leave a Comment »

“Most of the bees come to their end in the open fields. With wings frayed from the winds the summer workers reach the limit of their strength and expire.  Bees that die within the hive are carried outside by the workers – yet this is a rare occurrence.  As many observers have reported, dying bees will use their last remaining strength to creep beyond the landing board.  A Law of the insect city apparently leads the exhausted bees to leave the interior of the hive and so save their fellow workers the task of removing their bodies.  The queen seems to be guided by the same instinct, leaving the hive when her end is near.  For cleanliness is one of the unwritten laws of the insect city. It is inherent in the bees. ”

From: ‘The Golden Throng’ by Edwin Way Teale – republished by Alpha Books of Dorset in 1968.

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Bee Afraid, Bee Very Afraid!

Posted in Bee Lore, Bee Present, Beekeeping on October 19, 2007| 1 Comment »

They’ve built barriers, shone flashlights and even burned their rubber-soled shoes.  yet try as they might, African farmers struggle to keep elephants from trampling their land and destroying their crops.

The answer, finally, may be found in the sound of a swarm of buzzing bees.  “They really bolted,” says Lucy King at the University of Oxford, whose team played 4-minute recordings of bees to 17 herds of elephants in the Buffalo Springs and Samburo national reserves in Kenya.  “One herd even ran across a river to get away.”

King successfully deterred 16 of the 17 herds by playing them recordings from speakers hidden in a portable fake tree trunk.  Some herds put more than 100 metres between them and the buzz.  The average “safe” distance for the elephants was 64 metres, compared with just 20 metres to avoid white noise (Current Biology, vol 17, p R832).

King decided to act after hearing that elephants avoid trees containing beehives.  One game warden told her of seeing a large bull elephant being stung up its trunk.  “It went completely beserk, apparently,” she says.

Although the recordings work well, the equipment needed to play it is expensive.  King believes a cheaper, more sustainable solution is to use real beehives, with the honey they supply providing additional food and income for farmers.  She is conducting field trials using real hives to discover what effect they have on elephants, and just how sweet the benefits are for farmers.

From: New Scientist, 13 October 2007, page5

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The Edinburgh Beekeeper’s Funeral

Posted in Bee Lore, Bee Present, Beekeeping, Beetwixt & Beetween on September 24, 2007| 2 Comments »

I have a very old friend who lives in Scotland.  He told me of an uncle of his who used to keep bees in his roof garden in Edinburgh.  Unfortuately, his uncle died and the day of his dead uncle’s funeral, arrangements were made for a hearse to take his body to the local church.  The story goes that the bees swarmed and followed the hearse down the road to the church.  What a beautiful send-off from the bees!

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Swarm Settles on a Horse!

Posted in Bee Lore, Bee Present, Beekeeping on September 24, 2007| Leave a Comment »

When we moved into our new cottage, we soon met the neighbours.  One neighbour told us of an old lady who has kept bees for over forty years who lives a bit further up the lane.  One day her bees swarmed into the next door field and settled……….on a white horse – owned by our neighbour!  The swarm then left the horse and finally settled in a tree.  The old lady (a bit younger then) caught the swarm and put it back into one of her hives.  Quite extraordinary!  I have heard of swarms settling in many strange places – but never on a horse!  When I finally met the old lady, she was not aware the bees had settled on the horse.  Perhaps it is just a good story!  Who knows?

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Tears of Ra, the Sun god

Posted in Bee Lore, Bee-ology, Beetwixt & Beetween on August 24, 2007| 18 Comments »

According to one ancient egyptian myth, honey bees were the tears of the sun god Ra.  In this context, the bee was seen as the messenger of the gods, falling down, like tears, towards the earth (and man) to pass on some secret message.

 

The above symbol was called the Udjat in ancient times.  It is now more commonly called the Eye of Ra or Eye of Horus and represents the right eye of the Egyptian Falcon God Horus and was also associated with the Sun God Ra.  It is supposed to be where the tears (or bees) came from.

According to another legend, the left eye was torn from Horus by his brother Seth. It was magically restored by Thoth, the God of Magick.  After the restoration, some stories state, Horus made a gift of the eye to Osiris, which allowed this solar deity to rule the underworld.

The Eye of Horus was also believed to have healing and protective power, and it was used as a protective amulet, and as a medical measuring device, using the mathematical proportions of the eye to determine the proportions of ingredients in medical preparations) to prepare medications. The Egyptians did write prescriptions. Those prescriptions were composed first of magical verses and then secondly the real prescription. The Eye of Horus was an important part of the magical part of the prescription. With time the magical part became smaller, and the real prescription more important.  Eventually, all that was left of the magical verse was the Eye of Horus. The sign has remained in pharmacist’s shorthand to this day with Rx being the sign for a prescription!  Many bee products are used for healing and it is likely that there the direct connection between bees and good health goes back before Ancient Egypt.

Together, the left and right eyes represented the whole of the universe, a concept similar to that of the Taoist Yin-yang symbol.  Spiritually, the right eye reflects solar, masculine energy, as well as reason and mathematics.  The left eye reflects fluid, feminine, lunar energy, and rules intuition and magic.  Together, they represent the combined, transcendent power of Horus.

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Origins of the Honeymoon

Posted in Bee Lore, Bee Present on August 24, 2007| Leave a Comment »

Legend has it that about 4,000 years ago, in Babylon, the bride’s father gave his son-in-law honey beer or meade for a whole month (or moon) after the wedding ceremony.  Alcoholic honey for a month, with plenty of time for the couple to enjoy time together!  Quite a difference from today’s tradition of a honeymoon being long holiday away from home – and normally much less than a month!

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