Victorian Bee Keeping

I had a delightful day with Duncan, the beekeeper, documenting his work up at Brodsworth Hall in Yorkshire. I've photographed beekeepers many times now and when confronted with the sound of thousands of bees buzzing I'm always conscious of having to override the evolutionary instinct to exit the area quickly. I'm sure there's a primal drive to not be around that sound, a bit like catching sight of spiders in the corner of your eye. Something quicker than thought takes over.

But bees are so interesting, it's worth hanging around. The 'waggle dance' of the bees is something that I hadn't heard of before this shoot. In the intricate world of bee communication, the 'dance' serves as a remarkable means of spreading information within a beehive. When a foraging bee returns, it initiates a little dance, the dance is a choreographed performance, involving intricate movements and vibrations. The direction of the dance in relation to the hive's vertical sections is key. If it's a vertical dance, it means "head towards the sun." Deviations from 90 degrees are signified by the angles of the bees position in the dance . The length and intensity of the dance also tells other bees how far and plentiful the food source is... 🤯

How someone, somewhere, managed to decipher these subtle bee movements is utterly mind boggling. Short of donning a bee suit and getting into the hive with an angle finder, I'm constantly amazed at the depths of human curiosity required to unlock these sorts of mysteries. 🐝🕺

📸 for @englishheritage
Location | Brodsworth Hall