Installing the Bee's (Part 1)

P1010653           Are you adding a note or a person?

 A LESSON IN HUMILITY

I labored over how to tell the tale of the bee installation. The truth wasn't going to be pretty and neat......overly impressive.....nor  pleasant and sweet to admit. So omission was a serious consideration...........well OK, not a serious consideration................but I had toyed with the idea of embellishment of some sort for damage control. After-all I had thought myself quite prepared for this moment.............you know ...where the rubber meets the road of life. There is no more book help....no more Mary Lu holding my hand........just sheer guts..... a strong belief, a steadfast resolve, and Donna yelling "You can do this Renee,...........cause if you don't I will!"..... just as my hand dived into a box full of 10,000 bee's to rescue the queen.

But before I begin....without a proper introduction of "the queen bee", concepts could be lost that are crucial to my story. The queen is the heartbeat of the hive....without her the worker bees' could not survive. The queen is incapable of taking care of herself and so she needs an entourage of sorts.......her "attendants". They groom her....feed her.........care for her in every way in order for her existence to be productive. At her best she is capable of laying 1500 eggs a day. Without her attendants she would surely die.

That being said, I pick up  my bee journal and  write:

 April 23, 2010

---Installing the bee's

Donna came into town to hep me install my first colony. The temps were cool (in the low 50"s). Misty rain, but not the downpour they had predicted.

What a time we had.

We lit our smoker....the smell of it was warm and woodsy and put us in a wonderful frame of mine as we then put our gear on (jacket,veil, gloves, elastic around the cuffs of our pant legs). We were ready....more than excited.........and full of a mixture of concern and apprehension.

I pried the top off the cover of the box of bees with Greg's pliers.....keeping my hand pressed hard against its surface as not to dislodge the them. Finally the top is  loose.....OMG!!   I don't know what to expect.....are they all going to fly in my face........or is the feed can blocking their exist to freedom. The Queen is safe inside a cage of her very own inside the box. She has to be slowly introduced to the hive in this fashion....or they could kill her. So I began lifting the feeder can.....little by little......a sigh of relief as I see it is taking up the entire circumstance of the opening. As instructed, I needed  to lift it up one inch , as Donna was to pull the tap the queen cage was attached to.   Which she did.......with more vigor then either of us had anticipated. Since the tab was connected to her suspended cage within the bee box, she fell to the floor and I had to go after her! EEEH!  I was consumed with dread...."I don't think I can do this, Donna"...(I really needed some encouragement .....fast!) and she yells back " You can do this Renee"................then she added............"cause if you don't, I will!" The hell she would.

Thousands upon thousands of bee's filled the air around us. A tempest of tiny winged creatures upset at the aggressive handling they had endured. My hand dove into the hive and pulled the queens cage out.........very carefully...........we smoked them again, our hopes to calm them bought us extra time. And I cried out......"I got her!"  Donna peered inside her cage and discovered our greatest fear..........there were four other bee's in the cage with her!!!! Might they kill her, we thought. Donna was sure of it and I just didn't know what  to think or do. This wasn't covered in bee school..........this wasn't in my damn books........this wasn't even in any discussions I have had with other beekeepers. How in God's name could those bees have gotten in there with her.

We were in a full fledged panic!

We had to make a decision and quickly..........time was not on our side. Convinced with the notion that those four bees would sting her to death, we made the decision to separate her from them. But how? We tried prying the other bees away from her. They were having none of it. They would not allow us near their queen. And so the decision was made...........we would have to destroy the four worker bees for the good of the entire hive. It went against everything I had been trained to do. I was heartbroken as I used my tiny screw driver and made fast work of destroying worker bee #1. I felt sick inside.........Donna was still in shock and I was working feverishly to get the other three bees out of the way. I didn't have the stomach to kill them. And that is when the queen took flight. I could not believe my eyes.........out she flew......she was gone.......out there all defenseless and my hive was now queen less!

I could barely look Donna in the eyes. She just kept repeating, "I told you not to do that...it was a no brainer...." I felt lower than a slug. Beside myself....what could I do to buy back those last 2 minutes? How could I have allowed such a thing to happen. But sadly and tragically enough, the deed was done.

The queen was out of the hive..........on her own.......with nary a bee for protection. And we were helpless to do anything but hope................ Then Donna's voice filled me with guilt. "I told you that would happen. That was a no brainer....why didn't you listen to me." The look on her face was filled with disdain, disappointment, and shock. She could barely accept what my actions had caused. Thankfully, the one thing she did not say was "I traveled 2000  miles to watch you let the queen escape!!!  I didn't know where to go with the guilt that was filling me up. My heart was down around my bee boots, and I felt as helpless as the poor queen that was left defenseless.

I took a deep breath.......OK, I reasoned....what is done is done.......I can only move forward and I must not allow regret to keep me paralyzed. I said a short prayer.............and then it came....the answer..........."relax, trust Me...Everything is going to work out....step out of the past and use your inner resources." And then I felt the shift. Everything really would be OK. I could feel it deep inside. I just didn't know how but I did trust my inner voice. And it was without error...this I knew.......my anguish gave way to promise and faith. And yes.......I was rewarded.

Then Donna cried out again, "I told you that would happen." I swear, her disappointment was shattering my already shredded heart. My ego rose up swiftly, you would have thought this was HER queen....Her hive!.

And in that single moment it became very clear.....this was her queen....her hive. She had lived through every bit of the past 2 years  of my retelling her my adventures with the bees. She was totally vested in this project. Had traveled thousand of miles. She was as caught up as I, in her love for the them. The bees were in her heart and in her spirit. And now she had lost the queen and possibly the hive.

I felt sick. I just kept apologizing over and over, "I'm so sorry Donna,,,,,,,I am so sorry that I lost the queen.

But it was MY queen too, I kept reasoning. Then again, that tiny voice inside that never lies reared its head. "It was as much her queen as it was yours......maybe more........... we'll never know.  Little did we know that mother earth was on our side and we were about to get another chance to rescue the Queen.

To be continued.

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