KEEPING BEES

I went to see some bees today.

"I see bees all the time," said Tim, "They're always in my garden."

Perhaps. But I bet Tim hasn't seen the inside working of a hive, or held aloft a frame dripping with wax and humming with happy honey bees.

These creatures are amazing. An elite squadron goes out to find nectar, then, when they've found it, they buzz back and tell everyone else where it is by dancing. The angle they move indicates the angle to fly relative to the sun and the number of waggles they do tells the hive how far away the food is.

We saw a worker bee being born. She wriggled her way out of a hexagonal cell and popped through the waxy cap, ready to join the community.

We saw the queen too - long and langourous, surrounded by worker bees. She'd had her wings clipped (to stop them all swarming I suppose) and was milling about on a frame kept under the queen-excluder, a mesh with holes just too small for her to fly through, much like Windsor Castle I suppose.

Anyway, this was all another brilliant initiative from the people who run the business park. We've had honeybees here for a while, next to the lake, under the dappled shade of some tall trees. I guess someone thought it might be interesting for people to find out more about them!

And it was! My only regret was that there was no-one else from my company there - just strangers who all knew each other, which is (I'll admit) my least favourite social situation. Still, I'm less daunted than I used to be and tried to fit in, rather like a drone at the edge of a waggle of workers.

"How was it?" asked Erica when I got back.

"Awesome!" I buzzed, "I learned loads!"

I don't think I could keep bees but I'm fascinated by this incredible community of dance and survival. It seems, instinctively every bee in the hive just knows what it's supposed to do. Within seconds of emerging from the honeycomb cell, the baby bee we saw was cleaned up and got straight to work turning nectar into food and making honey with the hive-mind.

I sat at my desk and logged into my computer, thoughtfully, thinking about the queen, the workers and the drones - each innately aware of how they fit, of their purpose in the group.

Some days I can't even remember my Windows password.