excerpts from Many Best Kept Secrets

Book Reviews

Many Best Kept Secrets

Excerpts from Chapter One of Kirk Webster’s Important New Book

Even if you can’t see the inside of a hive of bees, it’s fascinating just to watch the colony entrance and the bees coming and going from a beekeeper’s pine box, or from the knothole of an oak tree in the forest. You can’t see the nectar they’re carrying inside their bodies, but you can see the pellets of pollen attached to their legs; a different color for each different species of plant they are visiting. A little study and observation reveals that this pollen could come from anywhere within at least two miles of this hive entrance. Thousands of bees effortlessly navigate back and forth from our hive entrance to the flowers; despite clouds, wind, showers, and a constantly moving sun. If you plug up the entrance hole in a wooden beehive, and drill another hole four inches away for the bees to get in and out, they will continue to return exactly to the site of the original hole, then wander around on the outside of the hive until they find the new entrance. For weeks after you will see them flying exactly to the old entrance site, then walking in a straight line over to the new entrance in order to re-enter the hive. Away from the hive entrance the foragers resemble Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle – existing simultaneously in thousands of different places, but never in any one place at any one particular time.

The flowers produce the pollen in order to attract the bees; encouraging them to move the pollen from one flower to another – sometimes to different flowers on the same plant, sometimes to others miles away. One colony of honeybees performs this pollination miracle and drives the production of seeds and fruit for both domestic and wild plants in a circle around the colony extending out for at least two miles. Clover seeds fall on the ground and wait, sometimes for months, sometimes for years, for conditions to be just right for them to sprout and establish themselves among plant neighbors. Now animals wander into the picture: cows, sheep, deer; maybe some elk or rabbits – all gaining weight and reacting to their environment in a different way than they would have without the work of the bees beforehand. When blueberry, shadbush or pin cherry flowers are pollinated, fruits are produced and other animals are attracted: bears, raccoons, squirrels, birds… even people. Through their habits and digestion the seeds are spread, sometimes for miles and fertilized at the same time. New plants begin to grow, confident that bees will be there to help them propagate – and so the connections continue on and on, from the smallest virus to the tallest redwood tree, to the huge juggernaut of humanity; until you finally realize that there is no living thing unconnected to any other. There are innumerable places in Nature to begin developing an affinity for this web, but for a creature with our unique perceptions, abilities and limitations, honeybees provide a very wide portal for us to see into, and then follow on.

I didn’t know why at the beginning, and I still don’t know now, but very early on I knew I had an interest in Nature that was not going to be limited to being simply an observer, or a monitor, a judge or a collector of fine experiences. I craved a much deeper association. A student yes… but more than that I strove to be accepted as a family member, a life partner for better or worse. I was eager to face whatever training, trials and humiliations were necessary to become initiated and a full member; someone who could live in peace among innumerable other living things. Where the coldest icy winds of a dark mid-winter, the comfort of idyllic days in spring and fall, and the blazing tropical heat and humidity of mid-summer could all be experiences of equal importance, and add up in unexpected ways.

I didn’t find what I was looking for by walking endless miles in the forest and mountains, camping there and planning ways that I could live in the wilderness permanently – though I spent quite a bit of time doing all those things. I found it instead in a collection of activities and perceptions that are vital to every person’s wellbeing, but where at the same time our culture struggles without even good language to describe it. The closest we can come is to call it: Farming.

But farming is a fraught word now that takes in a huge variety of human endeavor and experience. It’s all related somehow to our struggle to obtain food, clothing, shelter and energy. But it includes a whole spectrum, from giant corporate monocultures, moving toward all-robotic production; producing huge amounts of food, but at the same time degrading and poisoning every acre they encounter; to small Amish family farms quietly using live horsepower to reclaim and improve land ruined and abandoned by twentieth century “best practices”; to a tiny one acre farm in India where the desperate owner has sunk so far into shame and despair that he is considering abandoning his farm and family by drinking some of the pesticides that have put him out of business. And there are innumerable others throughout this spectrum. The word “farming” is a terrible red flag, alarming parents all through the “developed” world, who envision endless work, poverty and marginalization in the community if their children follow it as a career. Almost anything else is more acceptable, no matter how useless the end product or how damaging to the environment. Even living as a parasite from other peoples’ labor or resources is considered acceptable or even exemplary. As long as status and income are maintained, we’ll sweep the other considerations under the rug.

The farming that I sought out, discovered and built for myself (and a few others) is quite different from almost everything taken in by the spectrum I outlined above (though the Amish model is a very good one; they are real farmers in every sense, and I learned and copied many things from them). Most of what I built was by choice, and some of it by necessity. During the journey, I struggled for years trying to define what farming really is. Maybe the best definition I came up with was: “A creative way of life based on channeling the sun’s energy into useful products, in a way that fosters beauty, harmony and awareness.” In the end I decided that Masanobu Fukuoka (Japanese farmer and author of The One Straw Revolution) found the most elegant definition when he wrote: “Farming is really the cultivation of better human beings.” So, from here on, it’s something along these lines that I’m referring to when I say “farming” or “real farming” or “small farmers.” Much of the rest of North American agriculture I refer to as “industrial ag;” which seems completely appropriate to me. I talk about small farmers a lot, because in everything I have seen and experienced, these real farms and real farmers function best when each farm is organized around one, two or three families, and where the owners do most or all of the work themselves. This, plus the fact that many of them are moving away from fossil energy, means that their farms are “small” (in acreage) compared to the American average. I have to laugh inside though, whenever I catch myself thinking that as a proud small farmer, I must belong to a group where an the members are under five feet tall. It’s nothing like that in reality. These people are true giants, capable far beyond what most Americans can even imagine. They preserved the best of human traditions and pioneered new directions and methods, often at the same time. They lived (and still live) a wonderful, creative way of life, slowly and quietly improving and adorning the world one acre at a time; all the while surrounded by a larger culture hypnotized and overcome by greed and violence. Within this dominant culture, the real farmers, and how their way of life adds up, are almost invisible. They really are one of the very best kept secrets in North America. When some of my favorite beekeeping mentors wrote about their lives in the late nineteenth century, many aspects of real farming were part of nearly everyone’s experience in the rural communities where they lived. There were gardens around every home. Horses, cattle, sheep, chickens and pigs were everywhere, and all the best land was used for feeding them, or for other crops grown for people. Farm animals provided most of the energy for transportation and heavy work, and usually more than just a whiff of their manure was considered a normal part of everyone’s home, no matter how grand. Wood was needed for building materials and fuel, so forests were allowed to grow on steep or rocky land, in swamps, or anywhere else that was difficult to cultivate or graze. This combination of wild, semi-wild and cultivated land, together with a similar mix of wild and domestic animals, created a hugely diverse landscape combining European and American flora and fauna. A stable base for a farming way of life was thus established, and this diversity was also the basis for the revolution in, and golden age of beekeeping that was just arriving.

Now, less than 150 years later, the perceptions and experience of most people – including those still living in rural areas – are completely different. Though they still may be surrounded by some wild or enslaved version of Nature, their values have been absorbed into the industrial mentality. Their livelihoods now depend, whether directly or indirectly, on the exploitation of hired (or enslaved) labor and natural resources – often located far away and out of sight. The world of Nature surrounding them, if they leave their houses and turn off their phones, is now just another resource to exploit – for growing cash crops to make money; or for recreation when they need a diversion from their otherwise harried and pointless lives. The living, working connections, where all the human and non-human forms of life are in the same family, have been broken. As the exploitive power of industrialism becomes more and more efficient – and as the expectation of how much money each family needs to function within the exploiting economy rises – the money earned from growing crops seems more and more marginal, and farming comes to be seen as either an industrial process accomplished by machines, or a life of constant toil, drudgery and poverty for any farmer unable to adopt the industrial model. And so real farmers – whose lives and livelihoods are based on creating a better world, instead of using up and fighting over the only one we have – become marginalized and invisible. They’re very vulnerable, and there aren’t many of them left. Not because their methods have failed; but because it’s so hard for them to co-exist with and be surrounded by an aggressive, greedy, delusional and violent culture that’s determined to appropriate all resources; no matter where they are, or how they were created.

So, this best kept secret is likely to be preserved for awhile longer. In our worst moments, farmers wonder if the secret should be preserved at all. But for anyone who has succeeded with a small farm – is economically stable and with the constant fascination and excitement that each day provides – the prospect of working in, or even retiring near, the exploitive economy is incredibly grim. Worse than that, all of us who have spent a working lifetime with and around Nature, and have watched the world change rapidly during that time, strongly suspect that there may not be any other pathway for humanity in the future that can encompass real happiness, and the growth of our spirits. So to have hope we have to continue. We’re not ready to give up on that yet.

For the most part, this is a book about honeybees, and the bond that can develop between them and certain people. It’s just a farmer’s story about a working lifetime spent in association with these remarkable creatures, and a lifestyle ordered and financed almost entirely by them. Told in the vernacular of that vanishing tradition, it retains the perspective and prejudice built up there over many, perhaps countless generations. There isn’t much “research” here; just experience (first hand and passed down), reflection and the echoes of an education gained outside of institutions. If I learned anything about what’s really important, it’s the fact that the very best education involves using body and mind together. This is what makes farming so interesting. The labor and management are performed together, each constantly reflecting back on the other, and providing the real basis of physical and mental health. Jobs that are usually considered boring or difficult become an exciting challenge because they are part of a greater whole you are working to set in motion. Any study that goes on can spring directly from the job at hand, and spin off on countless tangents that become a great source of intellectual inspiration. Technical manuals, literature, books describing useful lives… even music and yes, even the dismal swamp of the Internet are all fair game. (But you must always keep in mind that the whole basis of real farming was identified, passed down in families and described in books long before the very first line of code was ever written.) Wherever you find intellectual inspiration, it only comes to life when it circles back to the farm or the apiary as an idea that can grow on the ground and help make the whole thing more stable, resilient and self-organized…

There are many books about honeybees and beekeeping. Our “best friends among the insects” (E.O. Wilson) are one of the most thoroughly studied of all creatures, and at the same time enfolding unending mysteries demanding our attention. There are books by and about commercial beekeepers, who tried and maybe succeeded in persuading their bees to provide for “normal” American expectations and aspirations. What’s missing is the story of how a completely dependent association with bees created and paid for a good way of life once familiar to farmers worldwide, but which is now diametrically opposed to the direction of a dominant society. My apiary, staying in Vermont year – round, with between 500 and 1,000 colonies – of which only 300 produce honey – is not even recognizable to the modern commercial beekeeper owning thousands or tens of thousands of colonies, and moving them back and forth across the continent every year. But it would be recognizable to the early pioneers of commercial beekeeping, who often built nice houses and made a living for their families from the 100-200 colonies they maintained just beyond their back steps. Mine would also be recognizable to Mr. Volohovich, the famous Russian beekeeper active in the 1970s through 2000, who supported his family, houses, cars and trucks, and set his sons-in-law up in business; all from just fifteen (yes, ten plus five) colonies of bees. This was only possible because the dominant culture surrounding him in the Russian countryside was very different from what we have here in North America. Still, I got way more inspiration and practical guidance from Mr. Volohovich and the American pioneers than I ever did from modern American beekeeping and the scientific establishment that caters to it.

Even though I don’t like it, I have to call my beekeeping “commercial” beekeeping, to ensure that it denotes making a living from bees and is not – like the enterprises that grow on trees here in Vermont – financed by some sort of unearned income. (These more numerous businesses are great for propping up local economies in the short term; but not much help in the long run when a net creative gain from all people will be needed to preserve the environment and create some kind of economic justice.) The best label I have been able to come up with for my business is: Natureoriented commercial beekeeping. As I said earlier, we don’t even have good language to describe the working relationship between humanity and her living surroundings.

So that both beekeepers and those not familiar with honeybees can read this book, and in recognition of the fact that most Americans live far removed from a working relationship with Nature, I’ve decided to continue with two more introductory chapters – a beekeeping primer, and profiles of my most important mentors. There are many beekeeping primers out and about now, but this one tries to give you the eyes, ears and mind of the Nature-oriented commercial beekeeper. I’d like to tell this story as one farmer to another, with a shared vernacular and vision; and without the need to pause constantly to justify or explain every detail. My hope is that no matter where you’re starting from, you might be able to experience – even in just a fleeting way in your mind’s eye and in your heart – what it’s like to live outside the normal confines of a dying social and economic system, and with Nature as a constant guide and companion. All of this was and is brokered by honeybees; and there are so many other large and small mentors that I think the most important ones should have a place of their own, so you can be forewarned, and not too frightened when you meet them later. They are my heroes, and because of them I will never give in to the normalization of a society defined by a delusional self-importance, or where everyone must be either the hammer or the anvil.

Honeybees can reveal so many things that are hidden from us today. I’ll share just one of these important secrets here; partly because I know you’ll never believe me unless you experience it for yourself:

The restorative power of Nature can only be tapped by working for the benefit of other Living things first, before yourself. If you can do this in a genuinely skinful way, a huge amount of energy is gathered and becomes available. Modem agriculture immediately breaks the covenant by selling this primary energy in the form of crops in order to make a living. But the real way forward is to re-invest that energy back into the natural world, and Live yourself from the by-products of that process. As the cycle repeats, the stability, resilience and productivity of the whole system steadily grows and eventually the by-products are worth more than the original primary energy was, and are produced at almost no cost. This is where farming and beekeeping are a really wonderful and important way of Life. There are many ways to experience this, but it was only through honeybees that I was able to understand.