Where most of the nature fakers fall down conspicuously is in describing how to establish a “bee line” giving the exact direction of the bee tree. Actually, when a bee leaves for the first time he is both suspicious and anxious to establish the position of the stand. He leaves in slowly expanding spirals and figure eights. The hunter rolls round on his back trying to follow the convolutions of the bee flight in the air. Usually it ends by the bee flying between the eye and the sun and thus being lost to view. If the hunter can establish when the bee leaves for the first time, whether the tree is more north than south or more east than west, he is doing well. It is not until a bee has come and gone eight or ten times that he becomes familiar with the stand, loses his suspicions, and, on taking off, goes in approximately the direction of the tree thus at last creating a “bee line.”
LETTING OUT THE BEES
Two bee boxes are on the stand in this illustration.
The lid of the outer compartment of the top box has
just been opened, and the bees are about to emerge
If conditions are right, of your dozen bees four or five will return for a second load. Again if conditions are right, in an hour or two these will communicate in some mysterious way with other workers in the hive that there is free lunch obtainable and the number of bees on the line will increase. Especially if the tree is near and the flowers not too profuse, this will happen quickly. At best I have had a hundred or more bees running my line half an hour after the first bee left. At times, and this is a common occurrence, no bee will come back at all. Sometimes the original bees will go back and forth but bring no companions. Often the bees will refuse to suck at all but will return on release to the flowers. When that happens, you had best pack up and go home and wait for more propitious conditions.
Why bees will load sometimes and not others, fifty years of experience has left unrevealed. In general, bees run better at the beginning and end of a honey flow when the flowers are not too profuse and too plentiful. Certainly if you are fortunate enough to catch a bee after heavy frosts, yet on a warm day, you will probably establish a roaring line in a short time. Why, however, sometimes bees will load eagerly and sometimes ignore the comb is a mystery. No changes in the thickness of the syrup, no substitution of true honey for the sugar, no aromatic oils like anise applied to the comb will cause bees to suck if they do not choose. They will often suck eagerly in the midst of the heaviest goldenrod season and refuse to suck at other times when flowers are scarce. Nothing is more frustrating than to catch box after box of bees and find them unwilling to load. In such case there is nothing to do but wait a week and try again. The most important quality for a successful bee hunter is patience.
BEES ON THE COMB
The original bees have spread the word to their
fellow-workers about the “free lunch.” The box in this
illustration is the one used for storage of extra comb, the
medicine dropper, the bottle of anise, etc.
Let us assume, however, that conditions are favourable this July morning. About ten minutes after the release of the first bee, a bee comes back. This is one of the most exciting moments in the hunt. An experienced hunter recognizes the sound of a honey bee instantly, but for the last five minutes he has jumped at the sound of every doodle bug that has flown by the stand. The behaviour of the returning bee is very different from that of the departing one. He dashes in circles round the stand, darts away again across the field until you think he will not return, whizzes back to circle the stand again and finally, in narrowing circles, poises above the comb like a helicopter, his buzz still shrilling. One waits with bated breath. The buzz ceases. The bee has come to rest and is loading. The line is started.
Soon others arrive, and the first comer departs. Once more you try and take his line but once more he fools you as he leaves in widening circles. However, one has got the general direction and can take a position to see better. More information comes as each bee leaves. In an hour’s time the comb may have twenty bees on it at once and the arrivals and departures are frequent. Now the bees have begun to be accustomed to the stand and frequently jump off and fly straight so that in a good light the eye can follow one for fifty or a hundred yards. Thus you establish your “bee line.” It is never exact, however. No two bees have exactly the same idea as to the best way home. If, for example, there is a large tree in the direction of the hive and perhaps a hundred yards from the stand, one bee may bypass it to the right, another to the left, and a third may lift and go over it. One is constantly revising one’s decision as to the true line.
