I don’t know if you’ve ever experienced a bee hive split. A new queen has been born and separates from the hive. A large portion of bees follow her to find a new home.
The first time I experienced this was as a child. I heard the humming coming my way. It rose to a roar. I looked around wondering where it came from just in time to see a dark, swift moving cloud coming right at me. I threw myself to the ground and watched as they flew about four feet off the ground over my head. I experienced this one other time with my kids but this time the queen and her followers flew into a three-foot pine tree on the corner of our neighbor’s property. It was concerning. The whole hive swarmed around it and right on the edge of our front lawn. I didn’t want my kids getting stung. We called a beekeeper and waited. It took longer than expected so I made dinner, fried chicken, mash potatoes and gravy. All eight of us had just dished up and were digging in when the bee keeper arrived. The family ran outside to watch in fascination as he calmly removed the queen and all the other bees just went with her. What an amazing experience for my young family to witness. There was only one problem. We had forgotten we left all the food on the table with Huckleberry, our Basset Hound, in the house. Bassets are big dogs on short legs. He couldn’t possibly get to our meal, right? In theory, that’s correct but Huck’s motivation for food drove him to do super-dog kinds of feats. We walked back into the house and our mouths dropped to the floor. We found Huckleberry walking around on top of our table eating…not the chicken but everyone’s mashed potatoes, which I’ve heard aren't good for dogs. He must have jumped onto a chair then onto the table. When he saw us, he picked up his pace, eager to get everyone’s potatoes before we could extract him from his feast. I once saw a chart on the breeds of dogs and their intelligence. Basset hounds ranked near the bottom. I’m convinced they are wrong. Bassets aren’t stupid, they’re stubborn. Huckleberry knew exactly what he was doing and that it was wrong. He just didn’t care.
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