67 A new apiary

My neighbour Annie Masterson had been on to me for more than a year now. Her grandson Alan, who took over the apiary of his Grandfather had no time to come down to Achill to take care of the last hives that were left. Alan had already taken a number of the old hives, restored them and places them with his in-laws in Galway, but the ones left over were suffering. Alan should get in contact with Timothy the beekeeper, but never got around to it. Now Annie Masterson herself was taking action. She told me that when Timothy was again in the Achill area I should bring him around. He had already been up the boreen once and had discovered that the two hives were both dead. Now was his chance to put in a few starter hives and bring the apiary to life again. With his van full of splits put into styrofoam starter hives it should be up and running in no time. Timothy was a bit unsure what his role would be. Would he be managing Alan’s or was it going to be his own? Annie Masterson made no bones about it. She showed him a box full of brand new frames and other beekeeping implements and said. This is your. Do with it whatever you want. I learned something new here: there are two sizes used in beekeeper land: Commercial and National. Apparently Timothy uses National and the apiary at the Masterson is Commercial. But according to him it doesn’t pose a problem. For now the old home made hives are replaced by pink and green painted starter boxes. He will take it up from there. One of the commercial size handmade hives in 1974. (67 hive CM February 1974)

64 Old and New in Polranny

We go back two weeks to 15 May. Dutch photographer Con Mönnich was back in Polranny after 42 years. He did sme catching up with old memories. A lot had unrecognisably changed and it took a while for him to find back his bearings. One of the places he revisited was the farm of our neighbours the Masterson. Sadly 20 years before Pat Masterson had passed away. He was a great lover of bees. When he was home from constructing the motorways in England he often sat in front of the hives enjoying the rituals of the bees. His children left Polranny; his apiary was neglected. Grandchildren wanted to pick up beekeeping again, but they live up the country, have small children and busy careers. Beekeeping has to wait. In February 1974 Con photographed one of Pat’s homemade hives. I remember there were a great number standing together in a clearing of a mixed stand of spruce and apple trees well protected from the wind. When Con took the photo it was cold and there was no activity around the hive. On the picture you can see how lovingly the hive is constructed with a small balcony and overhang to protect the entrance to the hive. When Con came back to the house in Polranny the weather was beautiful: warm and sunny. The bees were enjoying the warmth and were busy gathering nectar and pollen. Timothy the beekeeper was inspecting the surviving hive. All was well. Some things never change. (64 old and new in Polranny CM 15-05-2016)

Corraun Mountain a mating site?

Once on a summer day I climbed Corraun Mountian. I started out from the northeast where the lonely little lakes hug the steep incline to the top. It’s a quietly beautiful but slightly creepy place that the sun only reaches very early on a cloudless day in high summer. When I climbed the top of the mountain was out of sight all the time so I didn’t really know where I would end up. Finally I came to a shoulder north from the top. It was so steep I crawled on all fours. On the last bit a lovely sweet smell reached my nose. It must have been the heather that was in bloom. Around me circled an enormous amount of bees. Where did they come from? There were only two beekeepers on the peninsula and one was my neighbour in Polranny and the other an old man in Owenduff Tonragee; both miles away. When I told the story to Timothy the beekeeper he was very interested. It might have been one of the elusive drone congregation areas, he reckoned. The drawing of Corraun Mountain was made from the north or Belfarset side.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch

I was away staying with friends in the Burren. When I came back after a mere five days, not only did the County Council in name of the Irish Water Board install a water meter next to the gate to the Polranny Pirates hideaway, but Timothy the beekeeper had also put an extra storey on one of the starter hives. You can never lift your heels for a second without the world you left behind changing completely. I missed out on all the fun! Now I have to wait for the first water bill in a long time to be put into the mailbox and Timothy to come back to do the second hive.

Drones

The world of bees in which I submerge myself is getting more interesting but also more unsettling each time I look into a new phenomenon. This time it is drones, the male bee. They are born out of unfertilized eggs and do not work. Their sole purpose is to mate the queen. The fate of drones is that they either die after mating or are forced to leave the hive in the winter. To prevent inbreeding drones don’t mate the resident queen but go to a collective destination with all other drones from up to 200 different hives. There the drones wait for the virgin queens to arrive. A bit like the old Irish ‘dancing in the crossroads’ where the young men of the different villages gathered, some of them with a penny whistle or a violin or a uilleann pipe and wait for the girls to turn up to dancing and courting with. The drones visit more than one mating site and if they do not strike lucky they have to go all the way back to the hive for refueling. As there are many more drones than queens and even thou the queen mates more than once, there are still plenty of drones that don’t get laid. The same congregation areas are used year after year and as new inexperienced drones arrive every year the place must be clearly signposted in bee-speak but unseen and unheard of by humans.

The Queen gets her wings clipped

Timothy the Beekeeper took out a pair of old fashioned bended nail scissors and clipped the queen’s wings. ‘Now she cannot fly anymore. When another new queen gets born and this one leaves the hive to swarm she won’t get very far,’ he grinned. Our neighbour had bees and once one of his queens followed by a swarm landed with us. We weren’t home at the time and before my neighbour had located the errant queen, she had established herself under the roof of the porch, between the ceiling and the roof covering. He never managed to get her out and for years when it got hot in the summer we could smell the honey.(photo Amanda Stevens)