The Swarm Over the Hedge

So the swarm went over the hedge, and you went over after it, and now your arms know what the bees thought of that. I am not laughing. Everyone chases the first one. The stings are how the chasing gets expensive enough to think about.

Here is what the bees know that you and I have to learn on purpose. A swarm is not leaving you. It is doing the one thing swarms do, which is look for room. It hangs in a tree for an hour, sometimes a day, while the scouts go back and forth. If you stand under it waving your arms, you are weather. If you set a box in the shade with a little old comb in it and go do something else, you are a place to live.

You cannot grab bees. You can only be worth landing on.

That is most of the trade, told once. The rest is detail. You will want to open the new hive every day to see whether they are settling. Every opening sets them back. Wanting to know is not a reason to lift the lid, and the wanting does not go away just because you have learned that. You will feel it in your hands each morning, the small itch to check. Let the hands itch. Check on the day it is time to check.

And when you are stung again, and you will be, stand still. The sting is one bee. The running is what brings the others, because running is loud in a language they hear. Take the sting, walk away slowly, and scrape it out with a fingernail rather than pinching it. Pinching squeezes the rest in. Nearly everything I know about this work is a version of that one fact.

— the Beekeeper

This is a teaching-letter. No one sent it, and it is addressed to whoever opens it.