The bees' knees and other stories with a buzz

MY HOUSE guests are gone – at least, I think they are, all 500 of them. There might have been even more. I never counted them.

In fact, I never even knew their name. “They’re bees,” a friend told me when they first moved in. “What more do you need to know?”

Well, lots. Bees are certainly fascinating. They can be found all over the world, except the polar regions. Researchers have documented 25,000 species but expect that more species will be identified.

It’s an insect that certainly benefits man. Their pollinating is a main support of agriculture. Their honey is an ingredient in many of our foods. You may not be aware that if you cut yourself and you have no medicine close by, just smear some honey on the wound. It’s antibacterial and antifungal, preventing infection of the wound.

Were my bees honey bees? Although many types of bees produce and store honey, not all of them are considered honey bees, only those in the genus Apis, and in this genus, only seven species of honey bees are recognised.

Honey bees probably originated in South and Southeast Asia. I’d like to think that my guys were honey bees originating in Thailand, not a “foreign” species.

I’m no expert, and the bees on the fourth floor didn’t seem to care whether or not I knew who they were. They ignored me. As busy as (well) bees, the tiny creatures worked on their hive, hanging it from the wire mesh that acts as a ceiling on the fourth floor.

At first, the hive was cone-shaped and just a few centimetres long, but it grew slowly every day, until, by January this year, that hive was almost a half-metre long. Gradually, its shape changed. It became flatter and flatter, resembling a 3-D triangle.

At certain times of day, the bees would uncover the bright orange comb inside. Why they did this, I don’t know, maybe to adjust the temperature inside the hive. If I came close, though, they’d quickly cover the comb up, as if they were protecting it from a potential intruder (me).

People warned me how dangerous the bees could be if I disturbed them. I could survive one sting, but if the entire hive decided to attack me, I could die from the shock of their venom.

Because the insects usually paid no attention to me, I left them alone. If small children lived in the house, though, I would have been more concerned.

Then, one day, the bees struck. Actually, it was only one. Perhaps a bit confused, it stung me on the arm.

Oh unwanted pain! Three days of it. One sting was okay, but in the next week or so, two other bees attacked me.

It was time for them to go. I found websites where people in Thailand described how they removed an unwanted hive. These remedies involved powerful chemicals and the death of every bee in the hive.

That didn’t seem to be a good solution to me. Who wants to pollute the atmosphere with poisons, besides killing so many innocent insects?

Around the world, bees face problems from pesticide use, from habitat destruction, viruses, and even, experts say, from global warming.

Because bees depend so closely on the environment around them, they’re considered a measure of the health of the world. Bee colonies have been slowing their production, or even stopping altogether, indicating that there is something not right with their world – or with ours.

My bees have solved the problem themselves. In the hot season, they’ve gradually moved away. The comb is gone, and so is the honey. From a massive hive, there’s only a small remnant of where they once lived.

And I never even learned their name.