A neighbour of mine has had a hive on the land behind her house for years,
hidden deep in a thicket of nettles and brambles and basically accessible only
from her garden. This was agreed with the previous owner of the land, who let
it run wild for decades - it is an ex-quarry and quite a wildlife reserve.
The owner of the land died and the new owners want to build houses there. This
is opposed by many people in our village and things have got a bit heated.
Today she found an eviction notice duct-taped to her hive: if she doesn't move
it by Feb 28th they will engage a professional apiarist to remove it.
It seems a tad heavy handed. I suspect she'll just move it 30 feet into her
garden, with the entrance pointing out over the field, so essentially no change
for the bees. But it does rather highlight issues like clashes between wildlife
and humans, the quasi-wild status of managed bees, and I'm dying to know if the
eviction order was to the beekeeper or the bees themselves!
Paul
