Hi All

All this talk of mentors reminds me of a rather embarrasing
experience I had a year ago.

I aggreed to show a fellow student who was interested in keeping bees
how I worked them. Well we got to the apiary and I told her that
protective gear was bad and that the most any beekeeper should ever
need is a smoker and a veil. She was in a nice short little skirt and
a light top - I always tell people to wear a white top. I was in a
pair of my trademark short pants and a nice propolis stained T-shirt
(as a rule any white t-shirt is propolis stained).

No sooner had I smoked the first hive than three bees from the hive
next door to me flew up my pants and stung me somewhere I had never
been stung before. The pain was not as bad as I had suspected it
would bee, but I now had to work out a way of politely excusing
myself to remove beestings - an act which would naturally involve
pulling down pants, and which in the treelees karroo can pose a
problem in polite company. Well - shortly thereafter a bee did a
similar thing to my friend and she solved the problem by running away
and so I did the same and at a polite distance removed the stings.
(OUCH!!!)

That was when I learnt that the Aloe honey flow makes bees a bit
unreasonable.

But a very good lesson for all those 'I work my bees in a shirt and
short pants' people like myself - make sure that if you are wearing
boxer shorts underneath that you wear a pair of bikini type skants
over them to limit the chances of these unpleasant stings x rated
stings.

My friend decided not to become a beekeeper. Now I ask people that
come with me to wear jeans, a white shirt and I make them wear my one
veil!!

People still make jokes about me being into 'beestiality' and so on.
Rather embarrasing. Given that a sting is a modified ovipositor and
that ovipositors are used for laying eggs it follows this is a bad
way to get........

Life is fun.

Keep well

Garth
Garth Cambray           Camdini Apiaries
15 Park Road
Grahamstown             Apis mellifera capensis
6139 South Africa

Time = Honey