Book looks for the Zen of beekeeping
Show Me the Honey tells true tale of an ‘accidental apiarist’
Dave Doroghy was semi-retired and living on a houseboat on the Fraser River when his sister gave him 15,000 bees for Christmas.
This past spring, Victoria imprint TouchWood Editions published Show Me the Honey: Adventures of an Accidental Apiarist, the former VANOC exec’s memoir about his bee-keeping experiences. The New York Times recently reviewed the book, calling it “a light read on the pleasures and pains of a beekeeper that will give you new respect for all the work — by two- and six-legged labourers alike — that goes into producing the spoonful of honey you stir into your tea.”
We talked to Doroghy a few weeks before National Honeybee Day (Aug. 15) about the trials and tribulations of tending the hive.
Q In the book, you talk about your girlfriend Jeannie, who also keeps bees. Were you keeping bees when you met her?
A No. This is pre my sister dropping off the bees. She (Jeannie) has a dozen hives. She’ll get a thousand pounds of honey in a year and I’ll get skunked and get none sometimes. She’s accurate, fastidious, by the book. I’m always taking shortcuts. But you can’t be absent-minded when you’re beekeeping. The bees pick up on it and they sense your vibe. You can’t be dropping tools and bumping into them. You’ve got to be at one with them, a Zen kind of thing.
Q How can you tell they’re picking up on your vibe?
A When you approach the hive, a good beekeeper will be in tune with the sounds and subtleties of the way they’re flying and will create a calming effect. A bad beekeeper will agitate them and make them want to attack you. So everything is done with intention, moving slowly, sensing their nuances, giving yourself a lot of time.
Q Do they know who you are?
A They don’t know who you are, but they don’t like anybody going in the hive. The act of going into a hive is very invasive. If you don’t go in properly, they become aggressive. You’re rocking their world.
Q Have you become attached to them?
A Yeah. In one of the chapters in the book, I write about a really tough winter ... and the Fraser River froze, and I was worried about my bees freezing. I fed them and insulated the hive and checked on them but I woke up one morning and they were all dead. Fifteen thousand dead ones at the bottom of the hive. I wouldn’t say I was depressed but it was sad ... it’s not like a pet dying but you do become attached to them.
Q Has beekeeping made you more spiritual, maybe in the way you relate to nature?
A I wouldn’t want to overplay that. Yes, in the sense that I’m more aware of things going on around me. You ask yourself questions like are the bees individuals, or is the collection of 15 or 20,000 one organism? And they’ve been around for millions of years. Even if we don’t survive they will survive. And then you look at the way they collaborate with one another. I love just pulling out a frame of honey and looking at them and there’s not one bee that’s not working at a specific task. I often reflect upon just how beautiful it is, the way that they work in harmony to create something really cool. The book talks in jest about us as beekeepers, going into the hive to steal the honey. I kind of take umbrage to beekeepers who put themselves on a pedestal and talk about saving nature. In reality, we’re robbing them of the one thing they make, their honey. Beekeeping’s a great thing but we have to remember we’re stealing their byproduct.