Race on to save 160k bees living in a chimney
BEEKEEPER USING HIS OWN DESIGN VACUUM CLEANER TO COLLECT THE COLONY
A RACE against time was under way over the weekend to save about 160,000 honeybees living in a chimney.
The bees built a 15-foot long colony of honeycomb stretching from the bricked-up fireplace of a house in Groby to the top of the chimney.
The previous owner of the building recently sold up and the new owner, wanting to save the bees, called in beekeeper Peter Clarke, to investigate.
It was only when Peter, who works as a lorry driver for a living, started taking the bricks out of the chimney of the house in Parkside that he realised the scale of the problem.
By late Saturday afternoon he reckoned he had rescued about a third of the bees – using his own design vacuum machine – but said at that point he urgently needed to recover the queen so the colony remained functional.
Speaking yesterday, he said he was optimistic he would have finished by the end of the day.
He said: “I’ve been doing this for seven years and I’ve never seen anything like this.
“When I pulled away the first six bricks and looked inside at all the honeycomb, larvae and eggs, it was a wonderful feeling.”
Peter said he has been stung about 160 times but that “it goes with the territory” and he would not be put off.
He said: “I developed my vacuum cleaner a few years back – it’s a box you attach and it sucks the bees out.
“It breaks my heart when I kill even one of them so I’m always very careful.
“I’m expecting there to be in excess of 160,000 in total.”
Peter was using boxes to create a portable hive containing both the bees and the honeycomb, which he planned to take to a farm in Market Bosworth, where he hopes the bees will thrive surrounded by wildflower meadows.
He said: “They are protected creatures but the law only half protects them, really.
“If they’re causing harm or distress it is legal to have them sprayed and killed.
“I just need to find the queen and then I can be more sure the hive will survive.”
Peter, 55, who lives in Newbold Verdon, said he was happier out in the open saving bees – despite all the stings – than going back to work during the pandemic.
Peter, who is furloughed, said: “We’ve had a rough time, my family.
“We lost my mother, Glenis, to coronavirus. She was 79.
“My 15-year-old daughter also caught it and we all had to spend 16 days in quarantine. I’m hesitant to go back to work and I’m much happier out in the fresh air.”