MAN’S FIGHT WITH 30,000 BEES.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume IV, Issue 242, 26 September 1914, Page 3 (Supplement)

MAN’S FIGHT WITH 30,000 BEES.

H UNTEK FOR WHOM STINGS HAVE NO TERRORS. -

The life story of Mr. J C. Bee Mason, a man for whom bee-stiugs have no terrors, is told by Frederick A. Talbot in the “ World’s Work,” in an an article entitled “The Craft, of the Bee Hunter.” “Sixteen years’ constant warfare against bees has. rendered Mr. Mason a hardened campaigner. The bees may drive in their stings so thickly and deeply as to render it impossible to insert another point, but he is unperturbed, lie docs rot feel it.’ -

Ono particularly exciting experience with a swarm of 30,000 furious bees is best related in the hunter’s own words “1 accepted an invitation,” said Mr. Mason, ‘to remove some bees from a chimney-pot on the top of Bletsoe Castle, in Bedfordshire. “I had a long climb to the top of the castle, buc the bees did not wait for me to come within reach of their home. They tame for me directly I pushed my head over the top of the ladder.

“I peered down the chimney, bitt could see no signa of the combs. Certainly theie were not any within reach. 1 thereupon descended to the base of the chimney and removed a few bricks. As I broke down the wall I could hear the mad humming of the bees, precipitated by my Knocking On the enclosure of their home.

“ When I had removed the last bricks the combs were exposed. Immediately densely black and moving streams poured out. They did their best to defend their home, throwing themselves against my veil. Many secured entrance beneath because it had worked loose owing to my exertions, and proceeded to vent tneir rage on my face. But I was not to bo denied. Making a large aperture, I thrust in my head and shoulders. “A dense mass of comb confronted me. It completely choked the flue, and the comb, nearlv six feet in length, was black with age. While I was fumbling with tho comb to ascertain its precise position the befts swarmed up my sleeves and attacked my bare hands. The sun was getting low, and I realised that a drastic final effort would be imperative. Seizing a flue-brush, I forced it up the chimney among the teeming mass of insects arid gave a sharp lunge to sweep them out.

“ Never shall I forget the scene that followed. The brush galvanized the whole heap into frenzied activity. '* There must have been thirty thousand in the chimney, and now they were buzzing and humming like fury. The air was black with them.

“But wo got the bees under control and had them safely stored in a box before night.”