Chapter Seven

The hive was now open to the elements, with only the queen excluder covering the frames, so it was even more important to work quickly.

'Let's have some smoke, then,' Mr Hedges prompted and William obliged by applying several puffs across the top of the queen excluder.

'Down you go, girls, that's right,' Mr H murmured, as the bees retreated into the depths of the brood box and he got to work with his hive tool, cracking the propolis seal and levering the metal grill of the queen excluder away from the box. This wasn't easy, as the bees had used brace comb to bridge the gap between the brood box and the super, so the queen excluder was well stuck down but his practiced hand soon had it loose.

'Now, before we put it aside, we need to just make sure the queen is not on this excluder,' Mr H advised. 'It's unlikely she would be but there's always a chance and we wouldn't want to lose our queen through carelessness, would we?'

A quick inspection of the underside of the metal grill confirmed that the queen was not there and Mr H placed it on top of the super, along with the few workers who had not abandoned their posts and were still busy amongst the brace comb.

'Right, let's see now,' the old man muttered. 'At this time of year, your bees are not going to be occupying all the frames of the hive. They're likely to be concentrated in the middle part of the hive, where it's warmest. And don't forget, your colony would have reduced in size considerably over the winter.'

William nodded in agreement and, unprompted, applied more puffs of smoke across the top of the frames before Mr Hedges levered up the dummy board, put it to one side and deftly extracted the outermost frame.

'Now, what have we here?' he mused, resting one corner of the frame on top of the brood box so he had a free hand to point with. He indicated a patch of rather brown-looking sealed comb. 'See this?' he said. 'That's last year's honey but it's still liquid so the colony can use that to tide them over while they build up their supplies.' He angled the frame so they could see the other side. There was evidence of the bees having been drawing out new comb but, so far, no new stores of honey. But that was not unexpected, since this was an outer frame.

The bees were beginning to get lively, flying around the humans' heads, and their humming had moved up a few tones, displaying some resentment at this intrusion into their territory. But, unabashed, Mr H laid the first frame over the top of the brood box, nodded for William to apply more smoke, and began sliding frames along so he could access the middle four.

'The proof of the pudding,' he exclaimed, with a chuckle, and gently lifted out a middle frame.

'Ah, see,' he said, and William leant forward for a closer look. This frame, unsurprisingly, had a lot more bees on it, forming a writhing mass across two thirds of the surface of the comb. Mr H patted the bees, lightly, with the tips of his fingers so they moved out of the way and the the comb underneath could be seen more clearly and there, right in the middle of the frame, was a patch of cells full of fresh pollen – mostly bright yellow but some darker, almost orange.

'That's come in recently,' Mr H observed, 'and, if I'm not mistaken, it's from those crocuses that you and your mum put into the lawn. Your bees are making good use of your Spring planting scheme.'

William smiled. Mummy would be so pleased. He could hardly wait to tell her.

'Still no brood, though,' muttered the old man, sucking his teeth. 'But there's a lot of bees here, so I'm not concerned.' He lowered the frame back into the box and levered the next one out.

'Ah, this is more like it!' he exclaimed. Resting a corner of the frame on the top bars, as before, he pointed with his hive tool. 'Up round the edges here, we've got honey – fresh honey – and here, closer to the centre, we've got some unsealed brood…'

William could see, inside the wax cups, some small, white grubs - the larval stage of the bees.

'…and here, right in the middle – see this beige coloured patch here? - we've got some sealed brood of worker bees.'

William had already noted that this was worker bee sealed brood, having recognised it from the year before, but he didn't mind being told again. Mr Hedges had a vast amount of knowledge of bees and beekeeping and William was very grateful to have him as his mentor so, if he did occasionally tell him things he already knew, that was infinitely preferable to leaving him in the dark about things he didn't.

'And, look here! We've got fresh nectar, too,' the old man declared, drawing William's attention to the appropriate part of the comb.

He turned the frame around to reveal a similar picture on the other side then gently slid it back into place and moved the one covering the box along, to expose the top of another frame.

'Right, your turn,' he said, holding out his hand to take the smoker. 'You're in charge now.'

'Smoke, please,' William requested and – as Mr H did as he was bid, saying, 'Down you go, girls, we're nearly done,' - he levered out the next frame, held it up for scrutiny and began to describe what he saw.

'Here we have more sealed brood, quite a lot of unsealed brood – some of them very small, so not long hatched, I think – and, just here, some eggs…' William lowered his head to take a closer look at that part of the comb.

'Oh, your young eyes are better than mine,' Mr H exclaimed. 'I'm struggling to see those without my magnifier.'

'…and some more fresh nectar, here,' William added.

'Anything else?' Mr Hedges asked. 'What about the laying pattern?'

The laying pattern was, of course, extremely important. William scanned the comb, reading all the vital signs and forming an opinion.

'This is a good laying pattern,' he concluded. 'The queen has started in the middle of the comb and followed a spiral path, right out to the edge. So, we have sealed brood in the centre, unsealed brood in the middle and fresh eggs out towards the edge. In fact…'

As he focused his attention on the centre of the frame, he could see a brand-new worker bee just emerging from her cell, having chewed her way out through the cap.

'Oh, look!' he exclaimed, unable to contain his excitement.

'Well, well,' Mr Hedges chuckled. 'The miracle of life. And look, William, see how her fellow workers greet her? Touching her with their antennae and rubbing their bodies against her? They are welcoming her into the sisterhood. She will take her place in the community, as part of one big family. There's a lot that we humans could learn about society from a colony of bees. All for one and one for all.'

He paused on a sigh, then,

'So, when was the egg laid, that that little bee developed from?'

'Three weeks ago,' William replied, still wide eyed with awe and wonder at having witnessed his very first bee hatching.

'Well, now we know everything we need to know about this colony,' Mr Hedges concluded, 'so let's close up and leave these ladies in peace, shall we?'

William nodded and carefully lowered the comb back into the box then began to move all the frames back along to where they came from. Meanwhile, his 'assistant' puffed smoke into the gaps between the frames to encourage the bees out the way so they didn't get squashed. When it came to the last frame – the one that had been lying on top of the box – William gave it a quick, sharp shake, to shake off any bees still on it into the brood box, and returned it to its rightful place. Last of all, he picked up the dummy board, paused while Mr H applied the last few puffs of smoke into the gap, then lowered it into position.

'Now, we won't be needing the queen excluder because we aren't putting another box on top, just yet,' Mr Hedges explained. 'But, as we haven't done a full inspection, we'd better give them some extra supplies, just in case they're a bit low on stores.'

He reached into his knapsack and took out what, at first glance, looked like a big, rectangular sandwich, wrapped in grease-proof paper but, as he began to unwrap it, William could see that it was, in fact, a slab of homemade bee fondant - a mixture of one part white, granulated sugar and one part water, mixed together and heated in a pan until it became thick, like fudge, then poured into a mould and allowed to cool and solidify. Mr Hedges had clearly come prepared. Holding the fondant in its wrapper, he inverted it and placed it straight on top of the frame bars, just off-centre, so it wouldn't obstruct the ventilation of the hive. The bees would make good use of that, as the colony expanded.

On a nod from his mentor, William picked up the crown board and turned it over to see if there were any bees on the underside. There were quite a few so, holding it diagonally across the brood box, he gave it a couple of sharp shakes, too, to dislodge them then lowered it carefully onto the top of the box.

At the same time, Mr Hedges had picked up the super and was manoeuvring it into another bin bag, to take it away. All that was left was for William to place the roof on top of the hive and the inspection was concluded. Just one more task and they could leave the bees to their own devices. Picking up the watering can, he went over to the water trough. As expected, the water level was still up to the top of the stone, so he placed the full can in the hedge bottom, ready for the next time the trough needed topping up.

Gathering up the smoker and the caddy, he followed Mr Hedges back up the garden. As expected, a few of the more persistent hive guards - who had been buzzing around their heads pretty much throughout the whole inspection and, occasionally, bouncing off their hoods - followed them as they walked away but, by the time they reached the middle of the lawn, even the most tenacious had accepted that they were no longer a threat to the colony and returned to the hive. However, their business with the bees was not quite done. The super had to be removed from its bin bag and each frame checked for any workers who might still be in residence. These were carefully brushed off until all the frames were bee-free – they would make their way back to the hive on their own - then the super could be put back in the bag and the ends tied up, ready for Mr Hedges to take it home and 'deal with it'.

Only now, with all the bees departed, could the beekeepers safely remove their hoods, unzip their suits and take off their gloves. Even though it was quite a cool day, it was pretty warm inside the suits, so it was a relief to be able to strip the top half off, tying the sleeves around their waists, like before. William turned his gloves inside out, to let the accumulated sweat evaporate, and stuffed them in his pocket. He would clean them properly later.

Mr Hedges was checking to see if the smoker was still smouldering. As it had been quite a short inspection, there was fuel still to be burned so he took the smoker to the outside tap and doused the fire with water. Once it was cold, William would empty it into the ash bin and clean the smoker out.

Returning the equipment to the shed, Mr H piped up,

'I can leave you the queen excluder, if you like. You can scrape off all that brace comb for your wax collection.'

William nodded, gratefully. He liked that idea.

Locking up the shed, the two companions went back into the Utility Room to remove their outer garments. And having seen them returning, through the kitchen window, Marie popped her head round the adjoining door and said,

'Cuppa tea, Mr Hedges?'

'Ooh, I'd murder a cuppa tea, young lady, thank you very much!'

It was another part of their well-established ritual, which varied only by the beverage on offer – on a very hot day in high summer, it would be a glass of something cold and refreshing.

Sitting at the kitchen table in their stocking feet, sipping the beverage of their choice – tea for Mr H, hot chocolate for William – the intrepid pair discussed what they had learned from the hive inspection and William filled in his record book with the date and a list of their findings.

'So, what did we learn today?' Mr H prompted.

'We-e-ell,' William began, 'we didn't see the queen but we know she's there because she's laying.' Mr H nodded his agreement as William wrote it down. 'And, she's laying worker eggs,' he added.

'Yes, and why is that important?' the old man asked.

After a brief moment of consideration, William had his answer.

''It's important because, if the eggs she was laying were developing into drones, it could mean that the old queen had run out of sperm. Or that she's a virgin queen who has failed to mate. Whichever the case, if the queen can't lay fertilised eggs, she can't increase the size of the colony because worker bees will only develop from fertilised eggs. Neither can she make a new queen, so the colony can't reproduce.'

'Quite right,' Mr Hedges nodded, suitably impressed with the knowledge his young protégé was demonstrating. 'So, we have a fertile queen. Now, because we didn't do a full inspection, we only know she's layed two frames of brood so make a note of that. Next time, we'll be able to get a fuller picture. But that's a good day's work, young fella. Well done.'

William finished writing Two frames of worker brood and added One live hatching just for his own benefit. He wanted to remember that moment for ever. Then he and Mr H finished their drinks in a companionable silence.

ooOoo

Propolis, by the way, is a resinous substance that the bees produce to seal any gaps in the hive. :)