Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
comfortable than a full suit, but bees do get inside it if sufficiently keen to do so and, if
you wouldn't want this to happen, then buy a full suit.
If you are in Spain and you keep the Iberian bee, then wear a thick full suit. Their sting
seems to be able to penetrate suit, trousers and underpants in one smooth and flowing
movement. Wear your suit with a pair of gum boots with the trousers tucked in, and
wear a pair of beekeeping gloves.
Wearing gloves
There are many beekeeping instructional topics that tell you not to wear gloves - the
reason being that you can't 'feel' what you are doing as well. Gloves can make you clumsy.
I know of a beekeeper in New Zealand who won't let his staff use gloves for this very
reason. I use gloves and I always have done. To my mind, if anything is going to make
me clumsy while inspecting frames of bees, it is constantly being stung. I've tried it and
my fingers became so numb that, after a while, I couldn't feel anything and I dropped no
end of frames. Repeated stinging also tends to put new beekeepers off.
If you want more 'feel', use washing-up gloves, which avoid the worst of the sting. If
you have many colonies, however, these will split very quickly. My advice is to buy a
good pair of leather gloves with gauntlets. When you are experienced enough to decide
whether these are necessary for you or not, you can then decide what to do with them.
Anticipating stings
The second way to avoid bee stings is to know when the bees are going to sting you
or not. This comes with experience and generally works well but, as with all livestock,
you never know exactly what they are going to do and they often break the rules of the
game.
