Book Review - Wild Honey Bees, An Intimate Portrait - Princeton University Press

 

     Before going any further, it behooves me to issue a word of caution. Be sure to leave yourself lots of time when opening this book. The photographs are so staggeringly beautiful that it is going to take you a couple of minutes to turn each page! The detail is incredible, especially the images from inside the nest, many of which have never been photographed before.

     Wild Honey Bees are for all practical purposes genetically identical to domestic bees, and a study of wild populations has much to teach beekeepers whose hives are not always conducive to the optimum health of their bees, and are based on maximum yields. Honey Bees in the wild have developed strategies for survival in every aspect of their lives, including ways to deal with recent threats such as the highly destructive Varroa mite which threatens bee populations everywhere. A creature called a Book Scorpion takes up residence in a Wild Honey Bee nest, where it acts as an effective predator of Varroa mites. The entire wild colony is in fact an ecologically balanced system with all its component parts operating synergistically.

     The text is interwoven seamlessly with the pictures, and the flow of information proceeds with illustrations at every turn.

     There is a detailed examination of the role abandoned woodpecker holes play in the establishment of Wild Honey Bee colonies, and their desirability to bee swarms seeking a new home.

     Traditional beekeeping is alive and well in eastern Europe where humans have been able to exploit a renewable resource in a highly effective manner, with minimum interference to the bees.  Much can be learned from these ancient practices. A few simple tools are all that is required to collect honey in a manner that is centuries old, and not destructive of the environment. Cavities are usually in short supply, but artificial hives are created using natural materials, with keen attention paid to the dimensions of the opening, and the height at which the structure is located - high in a tree, safe from most terrestrial predators.

     There has been a great deal of coverage, both in the popular press and the scientific literature, concerning the plight of pollinator insects, and especially of bees. The cautionary words at the end of the book are worthy of note: 

"It is uncertain where our long journey is headed. This depends on the manner in which we practice farming, how we change the climate, and how we deal in the future with the world of living beings, of which we are part"

     Will we pay heed to this warning? Only time will tell, I suppose, but our long record of ignoring clear signs of impending climate and ecological disaster does not leave much room for optimism.

     In the meantime enjoy this splendid and remarkable book to the fullest. I promise you that you will never look at honey bees in the same way again.

Wild Honey Bees, An Intimate Portrait

Ingo Arndt and Jürgen Tautz (With a foreword by Thomas D. Seeley)

Hardcover - US$29.95 - ISBN 9780691235080

192 pages - 172 colour photographs 8 1/2 x 11 1/4 inches (21.25 x 28.125 cm)

Publication date: 1 February 2022