WHAT A CAPER!

     The other day my two elderly spanish neighbours invited me to
go for a walk with them. We set off with sticks in hand and carrier
bags into which we were going to put capers, that would be gathered
on the way.

   As we strolled along they told me that in the old days there was less
wild rosemary because the mountains were heavily grazed by sheep
and goats. They pointed to a missing mountain which had been
blasted with dynamite when the railroad had been built. The man
who did it had stayed with them, he had come from Murcia. They
showed me a spot marked with two stones were a hidden water
supply could be found, fed from Tijola.

   We picked the capers whilst talking. Then they decided to take an
old donkey track up the mountain, they were excited to go this way
because they had not walked it for many years. Mostly the track had
disappeared and it was little more than a pathway. Soon we were
passing about forty beehives. The elder sister wanted to carry on
so we did. The bees took offence and started to warn us, then to
sting. The younger sister, in her late seventies, panicked and flapped
her apron, more flew at us. Oh my l thought here we are up a mountain
with potentially hundreds of thousands of angry bees. The elder sister
kept her cool, with head down she walked on as fast as her arthritic
knees could go. We followed and eventually walked them off.

   When at last we got back, we sat under a fig tree to remove the stings.
They were many, we laughed with relief and said we would never go
that way again.

   Sad to think that each stinger represents a dead bee. Some say that
the stinger in a worker bee is her modified ovipositor. Not sure about
this because the Queen also has a stinger. She also has an ovipositor
but her stinger is straight, so that she can remove it without ripping her
insides out, unlike her barbed daughters stings. The Queen  will
only use hers on another Queen.

   On the other hand the male, drone bees, conceived from an unfertilized
egg, possess no sting. In fact they are little more than a flying phallus.
They hang around in boy bands, lazing about in flowers, helping them
selves to honey, waiting for the scent of the perfumed pheromones
of a rising virgin Queen. Then the race is on to catch her as she ascends
into the heavens. He does have fantastically developed senses of smell
and sight, also very strong wings. The lucky winner gets to mate with the
Queen high in the sky but upon releasing his load his penis breaks off,
tearing his insides out, dropping back to earth stone dead!