If the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would have only four years of life left.
-Albert Einstein
The murder weapon in my next book is a bee and a stolen epi pen.
In order to make this premise believable, I had to learn more about bees. Luckily, I have a friend whose husband is a beekeeper. On a beautiful, sunny day last week, I made friends with some honey bees. Although beekeeping would not be my idea of a hobby in retirement, I have much admiration for anyone who has the patience and diligence to work with bees.
For my mystery, I needed to find a bee that is native to Wisconsin, but is not a common honey bee or bumble bee. I needed a more unusual type that could be linked to the murderer. First, I thought of African bees, which are very aggressive, but they don’t live in our habitat. Then fate stepped in. The latest newsletter from Olbrich Botanical Gardens had a two-page color spread featuring bees that were found there.
I was immediately attracted to the pure green sweat bee because of their bright metallic color, Sweat bees are attracted by human sweat, but they are non-aggressive and their sting is mild. However, they are in the same family as a honey bee and their stinger contains enough venom to cause an allergic reaction. Sweat bees like to make their nests in the dirt on the ground. Unlike honey bees, they don’t make hives or live in large groups. But I figured a dog with the sensitive tracking nose of Gaston should be able to find their nest.
Similarly, the long horned bee also has unique features that distinguish it from the honey bee, like the super-long antenna. The females are also ground bees. The males cluster together to sleep on leaves. Their horns are longer to attract the females. (Don’t males always have longer parts to attract females?) Long horned bees are also not very aggressive, but the females will sting if they feel threatened. I decided these bees are a better murder weapon, because their appearance is not as unusual as the sweat bee.
Nothing gives a person more confidence that to be zipped snugly inside a bee suit. -Sue Hasbel
I can’t have a killer bee in my book without Vlad having a humorous encounter with bees. I had to put myself in Vlad’s shoes, or to be more precise, in Vlad’s beekeeping suit. My friend Pat lent me her new gear, a lovely zippered jump suit with a hood, her wide brimmed hat with attractive veil, and some very thick gloves that reached to my elbows. I tucked the feet of the suit into my shoes. No danger of a bee creeping onto my vulnerable ankle. I was set for my rendezvous with the bees.
Her husband, Dan, had a coaster wagon filled with the necessary equipment to explore the hive. A tin contraption that looked like an oil can with a bellow was a smoker. Smokers calm the bees by puffing cool smoke at the entrance of the bee hive and at the top of the frames. Dan lit the shredded substance on fire and blew the smoke into the hive. This masks the pheromones that bees use to find intruders. The beekeeper can check the frames for pollen and honey, and see how much wax has been produced to seal the honey. By the way the bees were clustered together, Dan could tell approximately where the queen was in the center of the hive. He asked me if I wanted him to find the queen but I said it wasn’t necessary. I didn’t want to disturb the bees any more than necessary. After all I was an uninvited guest to the hive.
The keeping of bees is like the direction of sunbeams. -Henry David Thoreau
Some Bee Facts:
- All worker bees are female that are not sexually developed. Workers forage for food, protect the hive clean, circulate air by beating their wings, also provide heat by clustering around the queen in winter to conserve warmth.
- Only females sting.
- There is usually one single queen in a hive. Her job is to lay the eggs that produce the next generation of bees. She also produces chemicals that guide the behavior of the other bees.
- Male bees, or drones, exist to service the queen. Before you grow too envious of their life as the queen’s consort, be warned they are kicked out during the winter months when the hive goes lean.
- Sometimes all the bees will disappear from the hive. This is a good sign that the queen has died. It’s a mystery where they go. Beekeepers need to start over with new bees.
- The workers can create a new queen by feeding one of the female larvae an exclusive food called royal jelly– I’d like to see that on a starred Michelin menu!
- Dan and Pat harvested 280 pounds of honey from three hives this year.
Dan sometimes sends away for a new queen. She comes from the bee nursery(?) in a bee cage, a small wooden or plastic box with a side made of mesh, and a hole sealed with a sugar plug. The worker bees eat the sugar and the new queen will crawl out.
This bee cage is crucial to the plot of my story. The murderer brings the weaponized bees to a darkened movie theater in one of these cages, gives it a shake to anger the bees, and turns them loose on the highly allergic victim.
In A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream, Helena describes her friend Hermia,” though she be but little, she is fierce.” A perfect quote for a honey bee as well!
Janice Detrie 