rustles, and fluttering wings that indicate the many and varied activities that go on inside the hive.
“A week ago, when I listened to this super . . .”
“Super?” the detective interrupted. “What the Sam Hill is that?”
It was a reasonable question, really, for someone who’d never heard the common term for the boxlike hive component that fits on top of the brood chamber that houses the queen and her issue below. But there was something in his voice, an eagerness that floated just beneath the surface of his own awareness, and that’s when I suspected he might be prone to bee fever after all. Not that he was bitten yet, but I could see that his eyes were steady now as he squinted into the dying light of the sun.
Patiently, then, I explained how wild bees seek out sheltered places like hollowed trees or crevices in buildings or rocks in which to build a hive.
“Did you know, Detective, that swarming is initiated by a special dance called the
Schwirrlauf?
” I said. “
Schwirrlauf
is German for ‘whir dance.’ It’s quite a choreographed procedure by which the workers move across the comb in a straight line without stopping. And as they move, they vibrate their partially spread wings every few seconds, making occasional contact with other workers, as they sing in a high piping voice. It’s really quite lovely to behold.”
Despite its aesthetic merits, however, beekeepers do their best to prevent this particular dance as one has little control over where the new colony may choose to settle. To this end we provide honeybees with a ready-made home that consists more or less of a sturdy base upon which we place a wooden box, or hive body, equipped with movable wooden frames with wire-reinforced brood foundations inside. On top of this base we stack, over the course of the honey-producing season, a series of shallower wooden boxes called supers that fit snugly one on top of another like so many stories on an apartment building.
“Inside each super are hung, side by side, ten to twelve wooden frames containing sheets. The uppermost stories are not as deep as the bottom two supers. These are the ‘shallows’ where our hard-working bees construct additional honeycombs in which they store the excess honey that is not needed to feed their queen and her young below,” I explained to Detective Grayson. I pointed to the uppermost story on the hive next to me.
The detective nodded, this time as if he understood more, and not less, than I had told him.
“Only a week ago, even in the middle of the night, the buzz in this shallow was every bit as loud as it was in the levels beneath it,” I said, now confident that the detective would make the effort to follow my train of thought. “That’s because the bees were laboring round the clock to fill each cell with honey. And now . . . ?”
I paused to allow Detective Grayson time to reason out the answer. I assumed the same curiosity and doggedness that drew him to investigate crimes would spur him to puzzle out the answer to my question. He leaned closer to the hive, allowing his ear to brush against the side.
“By the sound of it, I’d say they’re almost done with the job,” the detective replied, smiling in spite of himself, as he brought himself back to an upright position with a heavy grunt.
I nodded, inordinately pleased by my potential convert. “In another day or two, you will barely hear a whisper coming from this super. That’s when I’ll know it is full and capped and ready to be replaced with a fresh one on the next warm day. With any luck, and the Good Lord willing, I might even find a pot of eucalyptus gold inside.”
I explained to the detective that the color and even the consistency of honey are greatly influenced by the nectars from which it is made. Honey from orange blossoms, for example, is milky white and carries a slight citrus tang, and alfalfa honey is amber-hued with a distinctive minty flavor, while the ever-abundant
“A week ago, when I listened to this super . . .”
“Super?” the detective interrupted. “What the Sam Hill is that?”
It was a reasonable question, really, for someone who’d never heard the common term for the boxlike hive component that fits on top of the brood chamber that houses the queen and her issue below. But there was something in his voice, an eagerness that floated just beneath the surface of his own awareness, and that’s when I suspected he might be prone to bee fever after all. Not that he was bitten yet, but I could see that his eyes were steady now as he squinted into the dying light of the sun.
Patiently, then, I explained how wild bees seek out sheltered places like hollowed trees or crevices in buildings or rocks in which to build a hive.
“Did you know, Detective, that swarming is initiated by a special dance called the
Schwirrlauf?
” I said. “
Schwirrlauf
is German for ‘whir dance.’ It’s quite a choreographed procedure by which the workers move across the comb in a straight line without stopping. And as they move, they vibrate their partially spread wings every few seconds, making occasional contact with other workers, as they sing in a high piping voice. It’s really quite lovely to behold.”
Despite its aesthetic merits, however, beekeepers do their best to prevent this particular dance as one has little control over where the new colony may choose to settle. To this end we provide honeybees with a ready-made home that consists more or less of a sturdy base upon which we place a wooden box, or hive body, equipped with movable wooden frames with wire-reinforced brood foundations inside. On top of this base we stack, over the course of the honey-producing season, a series of shallower wooden boxes called supers that fit snugly one on top of another like so many stories on an apartment building.
“Inside each super are hung, side by side, ten to twelve wooden frames containing sheets. The uppermost stories are not as deep as the bottom two supers. These are the ‘shallows’ where our hard-working bees construct additional honeycombs in which they store the excess honey that is not needed to feed their queen and her young below,” I explained to Detective Grayson. I pointed to the uppermost story on the hive next to me.
The detective nodded, this time as if he understood more, and not less, than I had told him.
“Only a week ago, even in the middle of the night, the buzz in this shallow was every bit as loud as it was in the levels beneath it,” I said, now confident that the detective would make the effort to follow my train of thought. “That’s because the bees were laboring round the clock to fill each cell with honey. And now . . . ?”
I paused to allow Detective Grayson time to reason out the answer. I assumed the same curiosity and doggedness that drew him to investigate crimes would spur him to puzzle out the answer to my question. He leaned closer to the hive, allowing his ear to brush against the side.
“By the sound of it, I’d say they’re almost done with the job,” the detective replied, smiling in spite of himself, as he brought himself back to an upright position with a heavy grunt.
I nodded, inordinately pleased by my potential convert. “In another day or two, you will barely hear a whisper coming from this super. That’s when I’ll know it is full and capped and ready to be replaced with a fresh one on the next warm day. With any luck, and the Good Lord willing, I might even find a pot of eucalyptus gold inside.”
I explained to the detective that the color and even the consistency of honey are greatly influenced by the nectars from which it is made. Honey from orange blossoms, for example, is milky white and carries a slight citrus tang, and alfalfa honey is amber-hued with a distinctive minty flavor, while the ever-abundant
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