The Golden Victory Women

Ten years ago, if you would have asked me how I wanted to spend my retirement, I would have said that I planned to raise sheep and bees. This agrarian pursuit seemed a nice counterpoint to my fluorescent-lit desk job. It would allow me to be outside a lot, an idea which I love. It didn’t factor in reality very much, nor did the difficulty of raising livestock, but retirement plans rarely have their feet entirely on the ground. That’s why they are fun to fantasize about. I knew I wanted bees to figure prominently in that far-off future.

Bees are nature's golden warriors. From the time I was a young person, I have had a love/hate relationship with flying pollination machines. Our neighbor raised bees and we had several cabinets on our property. My stepfather’s boss from IBM had orchards and bees, too. I have been present from the opening of the cabinets, have used a smoker to calm the bees and have witnessed the pasteurization of the honey and though my little kid brain marveled at how brave these adults were since the bees could and often did sting them, something of the magic of apiary pursuits captured my imagination. It has never departed.

The reason that I’ve always been a little apprehensive about bees and buzzing insects (generally), is because one of the cabinets we had on our property was dropped and tipped over and the residents were perpetually on the defensive ever afterward. They had a distinctly warlike buzz and when (it was my job to mow our copious grounds, back then) I rode by on our mower, they would zoom after me in a threatening way. To be clear, I’ve never been stung by a honey bee. I’ve only ever been stung by the evil cousins of those wonderful creatures: the Vespidean monsters we call wasps and hornets. In recent years, I’ve become a little less threatened even by those armed predatory scavengers, too. They serve a purpose but their stings are quite painful and everyone needs to be aware of how volatile they can be.

Honey bees may have won my heart years ago, but not my fearlessness, yet a more recent experience cemented them in the ‘friends’ category of my natural worldview. Just a few years ago, while working on a podcast with work colleagues we interviewed a guest who runs a business that saves honey bee swarms and relocates those that get into trees or houses. We learned a lot from him during our discussion, but what happened after that talk was what helped me lose my fear and distrust of the honey bee.

When he pulled up to the recording studio, he set a small box of recently captured bees on the ground by his truck. They were inside a mesh grating that allowed them to breathe and move freely, but they were keeping with their queen. While we were recording, he let them acclimate to their surroundings outside, which kept their stress down. When we were through recording, we examined the box and as I was standing there, one of the thousands of soldier bees came and landed on my thumb. She wasn’t angry, or even disturbed. She just took a rest and I was the surface that she chose.

Initially, my heart rate was pretty high. Over the years, I have learned to associate bees and wasps with the dreaded pain of a sting, but honey bees are usually quite docile and only sting when they are in imminent danger. This little representative of her transient queendom was perfectly calm with me. It was the least I could do to return the favor. It changed my feelings about the danger of a sting from them, completely and helped allay my irrational fear.

Admittedly, the buzzing awakens the part of the brain that releases cortisol and adrenaline, awakening the fight or flight response. To me, growing up by that dropped cabinet, the discomfort that rises when I hear buzzing is visceral. That kind of fear is hard to get control over. That the buzzing will invariably lead to sharp, painful hypodermic attacks is an association that humans have had since time began. Even so, honey bees don’t want to sting and will often try other ways to threaten an intruder before stinging.

It is common knowledge that honey bees die when they sting. Their stingers are barbed and stay in their intended victim. This, in turn, pulls out their viscera and kills them. Not so the wasp or hornet. Their stingers aren’t barbed, so they can retract and sting again and again. Honey bees have venom in their stingers, but it is not nearly as potent as their waspy cousins. Each sting from a yellowjacket or hornet is like a blow from a roofing hammer heated in a blacksmith’s forge. I still retain a tiny red dot on my hand from my last, albeit accidental interaction with a yellowjacket, and though, luckily, we cannot conjure the memory of pain, it is nevertheless a very powerful reminder that such a little creature can cause a world of agony. A disturbed nest can trigger thousands of warrior wasps all stinging together. It’s a nightmare thought.

Around the same time we recorded the podcast, I was waging a one-man war against three yellowjacket nests on our property. I encountered them while doing my mowing and pruning chores, and in each case, I have been incredibly lucky. One was located right in the middle of our yard and I fortunately noticed them flying around a small hole before I walked into a landmine from hell.

Each nest I have taken out has been a delicate affair. I have heard so many remedies from pouring gasoline into their nest to buying specialized smoke bombs to place in their entrance. Even specially formulated wasp spray takes several dousings to work. Such campaigns take up a lot of time and require a lot of sneaking about in the dawn or dusk twilight when the hellspawn are less fanatical. I have recently learned that Dawn dish soap (or any grease-cleaning soap) mixed thoroughly with water and washed down their lair at night will kill them and flood their nests. The degreaser emulsifiers make it impossible for them to breathe. It is far safer than gasoline for the environment and way less dangerous for birds and other helpful crawlies, too, but also somewhat cruel.

Eventually, I captured victory from the ground hornets, but I am now super wary whenever I am out in the yard. Queens from undisturbed nests like to find wood piles and rotten logs to overwinter and in the late summer, they begin their colony-building work. By late summer, a very unsafe situation is humming along in the yard. It’s a terrible reality for bare legs. A small cloud of raging yellowjackets is a nightmare scenario. They will follow perceived threats for up to a mile, swarming the whole way. They can deliver three or four stings in the time the hand flaps down to squash them and, if you jump in a pool or pond, they will hover above the water and wait for you to run out of breath and attack when you gasp for desperately needed oxygen. The horrid little nightmare creatures are also able to survive without their heads and can still fly and sting.

Even so, I have been making a concentrated effort to not associate honey bees and other bee pollinators with their evil cousins. When we planted some lavender bushes in our courtyard and they began to expand and thrive, I noticed that each day we had a lovely cloud of golden sisters plumbing the fragrant flowers for nectar. That small cloud of hardworking friends came from a hive—probably someone’s urban cabinet—which helps to pollinate our flowers and veggies and provides a wealth of honey to whoever oversees that small society. It still made me nervous to go too close. The buzzing awakens a deep fear.

After we chatted with the bee man, though, and my visit with that one brave warrior, I realized that my trepidation was undue. They were not going to hurt me, nor I them and, if there was danger, the bee would communicate their intent well before they got to stinging. Bees can change their frequency of vibration. An angry hive broadcasts a tone that conveys their aggravation. It sounds sharp, upset, disgruntled. Likewise, they have a hum that represents the contented music of a hive that is placid, safe and productive.

Bees have had a symbiotic relationship with humans from time immemorial. There is historical evidence that suggests that we have had a relationship with bees for upwards of 10,000 years, but probably longer. References to honey are rife in ancient texts and myths. As recent as 5,500 years ago, humans were sealing honey in jars. In 2003 archeologists discovered graves in Georgia (the country, not the state) containing evidence of beekeeping and honey storage. Burying honey in this way suggests its value to those people and its importance as food in the afterlife, too.

The ancient Anglo-Saxon residents of England understood that bees were emotional and capable of being reasoned with (in their way) and developed a charm for calming upset hives. Translated, the charm goes like this:

Settle down, victory-women, sink to earth

Never be wild and fly to the woods.

Be as mindful of my welfare

As is each one of border and of home.

The Old English term ‘sigewif’ in the poem conjures a tiny armored shieldmaiden, and that, to me, is far more precise a description than I could manage. The charm is earth magic, common to that period (9th Century), and represented an understanding that an upset hive could swarm and go to the nearby woods and take with it its honey. Hives may swarm if the queen escapes or if a second queen is born and tensions build between their offspring, so the Anglo-Saxons knew how dicy it could be to keep the little warriors happy.

Honey is still valued today, mainly as a food staple. I enjoy some in a cup of hot peppermint tea every night before bed. We use it to add sweetness to desserts or morning oats. It is an incredibly versatile substance that rarely goes bad. Honey can be used in wound treatment for burns and other skin-damage and diabetic ulcers. Honey is naturally antibacterial. A spoonful of honey can aid in suppressing a bad cough or soothing a sore throat. Regular intake of honey is good at keeping important numbers in critical green zones. A few spoonfuls of honey can also help with an upset stomach or recurring bowel issues. Regularly eating honey might also help prevent depression, memory loss and neurological disease. Honey can balance the body’s delicate glycemic index and is a good dietary sweetener for people with diabetes and heart conditions, whether genetic or chronic (which is why I drink a little every night.) The ancients understood these benefits, too, which is how we know about them now.

The elder folk of Europe understood that fermented honey made a quaffable beverage with high alcohol content. The Norse god, Odin, understanding that the Mead of Poetry would give him great magical power, including the ability to know all things at all times (I mean who doesn't want that power), cut out his eye for a sip. Celtic warriors drank mead from a cow horn, which they believed gave them bravery and imperviousness in battle (it certainly removed inhibitions). The Greeks believed that the gods drank mead and acquired from it their immortality and divine power.

Meaderies have become popular again, in modern times. Mead can be mixed with fruit or brewed (fermented) from honey from bees that frequent orange, clover or lavender blossoms, which adds distinctive zest to the drink. I no longer drink any alcoholic beverages, so, no mead for me, but it is important to note that, without bees to pollinate, wheat and grapes would be in short supply and so, they once again prove to be an invaluable resource.

Unfortunately, honeybees have endured several serious threats in recent years. Insecticides concocted to protect crops from damaging pests also kill honey bees, causing a considerable detriment to bee populations. This is just one danger. Many stressors prevent bees from being secure in our world. These ecological problems have contributed to a 10% drop in bee populations every decade since the 1980s. Genetic and viral problems also exist, though scientists are working to breed sturdier bees that may be immune to such challenges.

Organizations devoted to protecting bees (and pollinators in general) are working hard to educate humans and find solutions to help our bee friends. Honey bees aren’t the only warriors working to keep food secure for humans, either. Lots of other bee-like creatures are avid pollinators and need our assistance. Not all pollinators are social. Those dreaded heavy bomber carpenter bees that drill perfect 1/2-inch holes in my deck and swoop and buzz at passersby are also important helpers in the war of pollination. Bumblebees (different, but no less important) also do a lot of heavy lifting in pollination. 

Even our vespid pals are good helpers. Wasps are scavengers and don’t produce honey (at least nothing anyone wants to eat) but they do kill pests. Adult wasps and hornets are vegetarian, but they kill and dismember bugs that eat your tomatoes and cucumbers and bring the parts back to feed to their rabidly carnivorous larvae. Although irritable, especially as food becomes scarce in the Fall (which is why yellowjackets congregate around trash cans and sip the beer and soda left by humans) these heavy-hitting, sting-happy monsters do have a place in the web of nature and are helpful (so long as we leave them alone).

So, when I retire, or maybe sooner, I will get the necessary licensure and raise bees. The sheep may be a foregone conclusion. We may have chickens and a goat or two, but several hives of happy, contented, placid bees. I may even plant some more lavender bushes, just for my little golden sisters. I’m so grateful for the bees. I’m looking forward to becoming more aware of my responsibility to the bees. I’m working on my irrational fear, but it helps to know that, without the golden victory-women, we most assuredly couldn’t survive.