A story of some bumblebees. There were a few hives, not many really. You can recognise the bumblebees, they are the fluffy ones. Anyway, a small community of bumble bees started up, and getting along quite nicely. Bumblebees are not to be confused with the normal honeybees, normal honey bees tend to conform to most of things expected of honey bees, like looking like honey bees should, and behaving like honey bees should.
And then there are the wasps. The wasps tend to fly around in twos and threes initially, but before you know it, there are more wasps. You can recognised the wasps, not so much by them looking at pictures of pollination, but about free buzzing (apparently). I think it’s the pictures of pollination. Don’t get me wrong, many bumblebees (and honeybees) enjoy the pollination, but not necessarily looking at the pollination. The bumblebee stance is usually that pictures of the pollination objectify bees, all bees.
Anyway, one or two wasps fly around, some actually ‘befriend’ some of the bumble bees (and honey bees), and stop by their hives from time to time. There is the odd spat from time to time, but mostly civil buzzing.
Then something happens, usually a small thing, but a bumblebee or honeybee may question one small element of the hive they are in (like, is it ok to paint stripes on your butt?). Whoosh! Somehow the wasps are alerted to this, and they start to swarm. Before you know it, the hive has been taken over by the wasps. It is no longer a bumblebee hive, it becomes a pro-pollination wasp hive.
Of the honeybees, similar happens. Many honeybees aspire to being bumblebees, but going that fluffy may be a bit ‘too radical’. Honeybees are easily invaded by the wasps, but are lured by the wasp promise of not having to be fluffy, and are told bad stories about the bumblebees. The wasps say, painting stripes on your butt is fine, and if you want to shave your butt like you’ve seen in the pollination pictures, that’s fine too—there’s no need to question things like painting stripes!
But the bumblebees know that all bees should, at the very least, question or examine issues like stripe painting—like, who expects to see stripes on a butt? Who demands that butts be striped? Doesn’t butt striping take a lot of time and money? If you are busy painting stripes, oops, don’t notice the other stuff going on?
Also, (some of) the bumblebees ask you to question which flowers you pollinate. It’s not an order, it’s not mandatory, but it is a valid question to examine the choices. Some bumblebees only pollinate certain flowers, from a separate field—and unfairly they get ridiculed for being selective, or questioning whether bees, including bumblebees, should pollinate any flower that comes their way.
Bees, including bumblebees, should be asking the questions or examining the issues behind these choices. Bumblebees know that sometimes you have to go out and paint stripes on your but in order to earn a living. This bumblebee knows that selective pollination helps a bee see some of these issues more clearly, and by choice, doesn’t pollinate high-maintenance flowers. She also accepts that some bees already have their own particular high-maintenance flower, but it is possible to still be a bumblebee—the only problem is lack of clarity sometimes (focusing on the flowers, not the other bees).
The wasps are chuffed at what they have achieved in such a short space of time, several hives have successfully been taken over, including several bumblebee hives.
Sadly, I have this week removed one hive from my hiveroll. I was suspicious when ‘don’t upset the flowers’ sentiments were expressed, but the finale was ‘carry on wasp #1 and wasp #2′, whilst continuing to bait several of the bumblebees. It is sad to lose a bumblebee hive, but clearly she joined the wasps. Not really sure why she marched with the other bumblebees, only to paint on wasp stripes just a few weeks later. [erratum: it was actually 'carry on bumblebee and wasp', but the rest stands]
And although I have had the occasional wasp visit from time to time, I continue to remain on full bumblebee alert. No wasp invasion will happen here. Fluffiness rules!
Aside:
My wish for the new year is that our Queen bumblebee (or BB for short) resumes blogging, I miss her buzzing dearly.
