Bees

All too quickly our stay in Killin came to an end. Before we left M who runs the B&B with her partner R, showed us the bee hives they have out the back. She told us lots of interesting things about the bees and the way the hives operate. The way the bees make the combs for the queen to lay eggs in the lowest section of the hive and then store honey higher up, through a whole that is too small for the queen to get through. The way that the hive takes on the personality of the queen - if she is an aggressive queen the whole hive is likely to be more aggressive. The way the old queen gets pushed out and takes a swarm of bees out of the hive to look for a new home. Before that the hive will have decided to replace the queen by feeding up a potential new queen, or queens. When a queen emerges from the pupal stage she will seek out any other queen pupa and sting them to kill them. When the queen mates - just the one mating flight - the males that mate with her are killed by the process of mating. Any other males that survive are ejected from the hive and left to die. It all sounded so Shakespearean / Game of Thrones! M let L try on the beekeeper jacket for a picture.
On the way home we stopped off at Vane Farm - went for a walk up the hill and a visit to the shop and cafe. Next time we'll go back with our telescope and visit the hides.