A remarkable hive design, with significance for ancient beekeeping, is
the clay pot used for hundreds of years (and still) in Crete. It is used
upright (like a large flower pot) and has moveable-combs as a result of
top bars laid over the opening. I think pots with a similar design have
been found in ruins (Knosus?) dating from 1000 B.C.
I attended the Apimondia meeting in Athens (1985?) where there was a
display which included a few examples. Since I was travelling to Crete,
I made a point of asking about any working bee yards. The quest and
touring was an interesting combination of objectives, and lead to
several dead ends miles off the beaten path. I found several interesting
modern apiaries, and once was shown a remnant of one of the skeps, cast
aside near the apiary, used by a beekeeper's grandfather.
I finally found an excellent example of the clay skeps near a village on
the south coast: a bee yard carved out of the hillside, perhaps decades
ago, with twenty or so live colonies, all in the clay hives. The
beekeeper (in his 70's) and his wife lived in the village about 3 km
away. Unfortunately the language barrier limited our conversation, and
it was too hot for him to consider visiting the yard, but I was able to
observe the colonies over a couple of days.
The total volume of the pots (each slightly different) was about the
same as 2 standard North American boxes. The colonies in the hot dry
September were very weak in my experience (occupying maybe 6 frames).
Honey harvest was accomplished by cutting off lower edges of comb,
bringing them home in a pot, chopping them in a colander covered with
cheesecloth and draining the honey. A jar of such honey would indeed be
precious. The hive tool was a larger version similar to the standard
ones, except the straight end had a sort of fork, for spearing and
retreiving pieces of comb that had fallen to the bottom of the pot. The
entrance for the bees was a horizontal slot less than 10 cm long, at
the base of the hive. Some of the hives had a cross inscribed above the
entrance. The pots had 2 "ears" for handholds, although I think they
likely stayed in the same place for decades. The top bars were hand hewn
from branches of appropriate size (wider than a top bar) but there were
no spacers, and the top bars contacted each other to form (mor or less)
an inner cover. The hive cover was a 6 inch layer of grape vine
prunings, covered with a slab of slate.
The beeyard was surrounded by a rough wall of rocks. At the entrance (I
don't remember a gate) was a post with an old ram's skull mounted at the
top (I heard that this was a defense against the "evil eye"). There was
an olive tree for shade, and some clay dishes of water with flat corks,
allowing the bees to gather water.
In the rush of travel I had to leave, and knew I had missed much of the
significance of this glimpse at the roots of apiculture. Whenever I
think of the visit, I wonder whether that living example of ancient
beekeeping is still there.
Pleasant memories.
Kerry Clark, Apiculture Specialist
B.C. Ministry of Agriculture
1201 103 Ave
Dawson Creek B.C.
V1G 4J2 CANADA Tel (604) 784-2225 fax (604) 784-2299
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