Confessions of a Bad Beekeeper: What Not to Do When Keeping Bees (with Apologies to My Own)

Contents

Cover Page

Title Page

Copyright Page

Contents

Dedication

Introduction

1 Fortitude

2 Enterprise

3 Civilization

How a Hive Works

4 Labor, or How We Make It Work

5 The Three D’s

6 Swarm!

February Interlude

7 Thrift

8 Endurance

April Fool

9 Study, or How to Ruin a Summer

10 Bad Beekeeping: A Brief History

11 Truthfulness

12 Redemption

September Interlude

13 The Bad Ballroom Club

14 Fellowship

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Footnote

ch07

Note 1

Note 2

Note 3

ch10

Note 1

Note 2

ch12

Note 1

Note 2

Guide

Chapter 1

Cover

Contents

PRAISE FOR

Confessions of a Bad Beekeeper

"In a sea of beekeeping books that read like textbooks, it was an absolute delight to discover Confessions of a Bad Beekeeper. Bill Turnbull presents us with a delightful and amusing book on the basics of beekeeping. Through Turnbull’s self-effacing humor and personal anecdotes, readers will learn a lot about bees—and a thing or two about life itself."

—HOWLAND BLACKISTON,

author of Beekeeping for Dummies

This delightful and funny book will strike a chord with all beekeepers—beginners and seasoned ones alike. We have all done stupid things with bees, and I am glad to report that Bill Turnbull survived and learned from his mistakes. A truly wonderful read.

—DIANA SAMMATARO, PHD,

coauthor of The Beekeeper’s Handbook

Animated and entertaining! Bill Turnbull gives readers an informative glimpse into the enchanting world of beekeeping that is sure to increase their appreciation for these endearing creatures.

—C. MARINA MARCHESE, author of

Honeybee: Lessons from an Accidental Beekeeper

Every beekeeper begins as a bad beekeeper. Fortunately, Bill Turnbull remembers his hilarious beekeeping mistakes and adventures in great detail, and he has bravely transformed them into this honest, entertaining book. It is a must-read even for experienced beekeepers who have already been there and done that, especially as they may have failed to see the humor that Turnbull so skillfully captures.

—NORMAN GARY, PHD, Professor and Apiculturist Emeritus,

University of California, Davis, and author of Honey Bee Hobbyist

What a fabulous, truthful book from a man who I am sure is a much better beekeeper than he claims to be.

—Smallholder

A jar of honey will seem like a total miracle after you’ve read [Bill] Turnbull’s entertaining bee book … Gripping.

—Daily Mail

His description of the pleasure bees bring is captivating and told in such an engaging manner. This is truly charming … A must hive!

—News of the World

An entertaining beekeeping memoir.

—The Times (London)

This book could make us all a little better.

—British Beekeepers’ Association News

Confessions of a

BAD BEEKEEPER

Confessions of a

BAD BEEKEEPER

what not to do when keeping bees [with apologies to my own]

BILL TURNBULL

CONFESSIONS OF A BAD BEEKEEPER:

What NOT to Do When Keeping Bees (With Apologies to My Own)

Copyright © Bill Turnbull 2010, 2011

Illustrations copyright © Russ Billington 2010

All rights reserved. Except for brief passages quoted in newspaper, magazine, radio, television, or online reviews, no portion of this book may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or information storage or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

The Experiment, LLC

260 Fifth Avenue

New York, NY 10001–6408

www.theexperimentpublishing.com

Originally published in Great Britain in 2010 in somewhat different form as The Bad Beekeeper’s Club by Sphere, an imprint of Little, Brown Book Group, a Hachette UK Company.

The Most Beautiful Girl words and music by Rory Michael Bourke and Bill Sherrill © 1973, reproduced by permission of EMI Music Publishing Ltd, London W8 5SW.

Many of the designations used by manufacturers and sellers to distinguish their products are claimed as trademarks. Where those designations appear in this book and The Experiment was aware of a trademark claim, the designations have been capitalized.

The Experiment’s books are available at special discounts when purchased in bulk for premiums and sales promotions as well as for fundraising or educational use. For details, contact us at info@theexperimentpublishing.com.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2011925090

ISBN 978-1-61519-032-4

Ebook ISBN 978-1-61519-133-8

Cover design by Alison Forner

Front cover photograph of Bill Turnbull by Colin Thomas

Front cover photograph of beehive by Gary K. Smith | Alamy

Back cover photograph by Sesi Turnbull

Text design by Pauline Neuwirth, Neuwirth & Associates, Inc.

Manufactured in the United States of America

Distributed by Workman Publishing Company, Inc.

First U.S. edition published May 2011

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

contents

Introduction

1 Fortitude

2 Enterprise

3 Civilization

HOW A HIVE WORKS

4 Labor, or How We Make It Work

5 The Three D’s

6 Swarm!

FEBRUARY INTERLUDE

7 Thrift

8 Endurance

APRIL FOOL

9 Study, or How to Ruin a Summer

10 Bad Beekeeping: A Brief History

11 Truthfulness

12 Redemption

SEPTEMBER INTERLUDE

13 The Bad Ballroom Club

14 Fellowship

Acknowledgments

About the Author

To Sesi

introduction

Hello. My name is Bill, and I’m a Bad Beekeeper. A really Bad Beekeeper. I’ve done bad things with bees. Terrible things. Things you wouldn’t understand unless you were a beekeeper yourself.

I still shudder at the thought of one or two of them. I couldn’t put them down here. If I did, and you were even a half-decent beekeeper, you’d probably stop reading right here and now.

But I keep going. I can’t help myself.

Why, I hear you ask. Why, oh why?

I just have to. It’s like they’re my path to redemption. Ever since a swarm arrived in our yard seventeen years ago, I’d wondered if I could be brave enough to take up the challenge. I still remember standing in awed silence as I watched (from behind the locked patio doors) a local beekeeper arrive with a pair of pruning shears and a cardboard box and take them away without any fuss. It was then that I knew I had to give it a try, although there is a second explanation involving a sick chicken named Tabasco and a trip to the vet, but I’m saving that for Chapter Two.

Bees can be very forgiving. They’ll put up with a lot. They’ll punish you when you do wrong and, believe me, in my time I have certainly been punished. But treated right, and left alone for long enough, their mood will improve. And like many a long-suffering woman—for bees are overwhelmingly female—they will give you another chance. Eventually.

And so I like to think, in the words of the French psychologist Émile Coué—or was it Winnie the Pooh?—Every day in every way I’m getting better and better. It’s been suggested that Émile Coué eventually committed suicide. But we’ll not let that deter us.

•

I’m in the rare and privileged position of being a BBC man twice over—once with the finest broadcasting corporation the world has ever seen, where I make a living hosting the Breakfast program on BBC One in England, and again as a founding member of the Bad Beekeepers Club. I set it up a couple of years ago with my beekeeping friend Peter Murray Russell, a kindred spirit who seemed to be almost as inept as I was when it came to keeping bees and making honey. I once found a road map in one of his hives. He offered a long and complicated technical justification, but I think he was just worried that they might not find their way home. By the way, reading this book confers on you honorary membership in this small but august association. Well, we’ve got to get the numbers up somehow.

Think of this book as a sort of induction course, to let you know what you can expect should you decide to venture into our fascinating world of veils and gauntlets and strange-looking hive tools. Let me show you how it all works, how the bees make the honey, and how we then snatch it from them; the pains and pitfalls you can encounter, as well as the joys you can experience even when the job isn’t done very well.

If you’re not convinced—and after reading this you might well wonder who would be—think of this as a gentle guide to demystify the process, to teach you a little about the insects that are so important to us, and remind you how you got off lightly.

And if you’re a beekeeper already, you can of course just read it and weep.

•

I just hope that if I keep trying, one day I might not be such a Bad Beekeeper. I might progress to being simply a beekeeper. Not a good one, but not a bad one either.

So, gloves on. Zip up your veil and join me as I pry the lid off my far too imperfect career as an apiarist. And along the way, we might learn a thing or two about life itself.

Ready?

Confessions of a

BAD BEEKEEPER

[ CHAPTER ONE ]

fortitude

In which we discover that learning can be a painful process. Even on the very first day.

It wasn’t the best of starts. In fact, as starts go, it was about as bad as it can get. But I suppose at least it was unforgettable. My first trip to an apiary—the place where bees live—became not so much a near disaster as a near-death experience.

I had been warned. You will get stung, was the mantra of the first beekeeping lesson I had been to at the Pinner & Ruislip Beekeepers Association (PRBKA), deep in the suburban outskirts of London. It was drilled into us repeatedly that beekeeping was not without its hazards, and getting stung was chief among them. And in a strange and possibly somewhat masochistic way, I have now been piqued often enough to conclude that getting stung really is where the fun is. Beekeepers can be odd like that.

•

It was midday on a warm, sunny Sunday, and I was more than ready for my first encounter with some live bees. I’d learned the basic theory with three other eager apprentices from our teacher at the PRBKA, taking notes about colonies and hives and basic bee biology, and couldn’t wait to get out there and try it myself. In the back of my mind, I remembered that there was a risk of some kind associated with bees. But bad things would only happen if I did something to provoke them. And if I moved slowly and calmly and didn’t drop anything, chances were I would emerge unscathed.

So it was more with eagerness than apprehension that I parked that Sunday afternoon in the shade outside the apiary; an enclosure about the size of a football field, dotted with beehives and, of course, busy with bees. The sun was shining, and the two experienced beekeepers who were to show me the ropes were already at work, with one of the hives open for inspection. I stood at the entrance to the apiary, where a white van was parked, and announced myself. Hello, yes, came the reply. There’s a suit for you in the van there. Oh, and just watch out for the swarm on the fencepost.

Ah, a swarm on the fencepost, I repeated anxiously, noticing that said fencepost was a mere eight feet from where I was standing.

Mention the word swarm to most people and they automatically tend to cover up and recall tales of how they’d heard that the aunt of a friend of a neighbor’s local paperboy was once smothered in one the size of a house and never seen again. They picture swarms as vast hostile clouds of wild flying insects, ready to attack anything and anyone who stumbles into their path. In truth, it’s not really like that. Yes, swarms do consist of vast clouds of wild flying insects, but they’re not usually hostile and can be fascinating to watch. After a while they settle together in a large brown clump to have a breather and figure out what to do next, resting beneath the branch of a tree or, in this case, a fencepost.

There they were, doing their own thing, as I gingerly approached the van from the other side to reach in for the suit, which looks like a large white jumpsuit with a veil attached. So far, so good. But the thing about swarms is that they are not static. In other words, while the main body of the colony may indeed be clustered on a fencepost, there can be any number of extraneous bees flying around it—latecomers arriving from their old home, others to-ing and fro-ing looking for new places to live in, or general hangers-on buzzing around just for the fun of it.

It was a couple of these outriders who took an interest in me as I started to put the suit on. Their interest was probably completely innocent, but it was slightly unnerving on my first time out. So, remembering my beekeeping basic training, I wandered into the shade at the side of the road. They’re supposed to leave you alone in the shade and head back to the sun. But this pair were defying convention. And clearly by now I was more than just vaguely interesting to these two, who began to hover around my head with some interest.

Today I always offer simple advice to anyone caught in this situation: Stand perfectly still, and stay perfectly calm. But I know from experience that this is much more easily said than done. When some persistent little buzzer is whining around the back of your head, as they are prone to do, your every instinct is to do anything but stand still. Run, shake, swat, hide; anything to get away. But I can also tell you this definitely doesn’t work. An Olympic athlete might just outrun a bee in a one-hundred-meter sprint, but since they can get up to twenty miles an hour in flight, even the fastest and fittest mammal would have their work cut out. As for swatting, forget it. First of all, a bee has five eyes. And thanks to what’s called flicker fusion potential, it can see at the equivalent of three hundred frames a second. If bees went to the movies, the film would appear to them as a long sequence of still pictures. In other words, they could see your hand moving like it’s a slow-motion action replay.

Hiding can do the trick if there’s a dark room close by that you could get to—preferably one that’s mildly refrigerated. Sadly there wasn’t one available at the Harefield Apiary that day, and I was about to forget the sage advice that I’m now giving you. I did try to stay calm for a while, until they landed on my head. Then, panic rising, I resorted to what came naturally and tried to brush them off, in the nicest possible way. Which is where we come to hair care.

Perhaps if I hadn’t been working that morning I’d have been all right. I’d have come to the apiary with my coiffure au naturel. But as I’d been in the studio, some gel had been applied to render me respectable for the viewing public first thing on a Sunday morning. As a result, my hair was slightly sticky. Not a problem for day-to-day living, except when bees become involved. They must have liked the smell; perhaps they thought it was a delightful new form of food supply. You can imagine the conversation back at the hive. What have you been on today, Doris?

Oh, the usual—dandelion and honeysuckle. But I hear Ethel and her sister have been on some fabulous new stuff called Brylcreem. It’s positively dreamy.

The problem was that once they’d landed on it, they couldn’t get off again in a hurry. Given time, they would have managed. But as they were being swatted rather frantically by an enormous paddle—my hand—they couldn’t exactly hang around. So they buzzed furiously around, or rather on, my head while I brushed equally furiously with the back of my hand. Sooner or later, something had to give.

I’ve never actually been hit on the head by a hammer, but that day I got a pretty good idea of what it’s like. (Although when I was thirteen I did suffer a good thump to the forehead from a croquet mallet, inflicting a bloody wound that required eight painful stitches above my left eye. The joys of prep school. Fortunately, most stings are mildly less life-threatening.) When a bee stings you on the head, there’s no flesh to cushion the barb, so it does feel a bit like a sharp blow with a blunt object, if that’s possible. Think of a hammer with a thumbtack attached. And since both bees felt threatened enough to risk their lives in their own defense, think of two hammers, both with thumbtacks attached.

At least it stopped the buzzing. But there was more to come.

Eyes watering, breathing heavily, and sweating profusely, I now had to put the suit on. As I was in the middle of a road, I had to do this standing up, hopping around and trying to maintain some semblance of dignity and calm,