Bees and the well

Getting bees

Build a hive and wait. An empty hive draws a wild swarm when bees are flying: warm days between 12 and 38 °C, in daylight, not in the rain. Flowering crops within about sixty meters make it much more likely, and the desert gives them little to forage. You can also Put a nucleus of bees in from someone else's strong colony.

Working the hive

• Carry a Bee Smoker and you won't be stung. Without one, a Bee Veil saves you from most stings. Without either, expect several.
• The colony fills its own stores first, then surplus frames. Take off the capped honey when there are frames.
• Crush a Frame of Honey with a cloth and two empty glass bottles for honey and beeswax. Beeswax and thread make candles at a fire.
• A strong colony with a full hive swarms and leaves with half its bees. Split off a nucleus first to make a second hive.
• In the cold the bees live on their stores. If they run low, Feed sugar syrup: a sugar and some water.

The well

A well holds forty liters and refills slowly, about half a liter a minute. Draw water gives up to five dirty water at a time without needing bottles. Boil or filter it before you drink it.

Real beekeepers leave the bees enough stores for the cold. A colony that runs out in a cold snap dies within hours.