THE CULT OF IVORY IMMOLATION

I admit it. I love the Antiques Roadshow, not least, I admit, because Fiona Bruce is really hot!

I also love the show for the wealth of information I can occasionally glean re my passion - antiquarian books and are historical documents - but today (December 28th, 2015) they included a segment that bordered on the irresponsible.

One of the items featured was a wonderfully carved champagne flute, circa 1850. It was controversial only because said item was carved from ivory. This resulted in a brief follow-up segment on the ethics of owning ivory items, given the plight of Africa's elephants.

The question was, should all ivory be destroyed in order to take a stand against the illegal ivory trade. I was gobsmacked there could be any advocacy of such an insanely short-sighted, simplistic and entirely tokenistic campaign.

Opinions were sought from two experts. One, Mr. Will Travers of the Born Free Foundation, the other Dr. Marjorie Trusted, Senior Curator of the Victoria & Albert Museum, custodians of perhaps the world's largest collection of ivory artifacts.

Not surprisingly, Mr. Travers waxed on about his feelings, stating that when he looks at works in ivory all he sees is dead elephants. Not content with this Sixth Sense-esque sharing moment, he also went into detail about the heartbreaking sight and smell of the many dead elephants he’d stood beside in the wild.

Dr. Trusted, on the other hand, spoke of the great wealth of ivory artifacts extant and their artistic as well as historical significance.

Now let me be clear. I am absolutely against the killing of elephants for their tusks. However, that anyone could possibly be so driven by their emotions as to believe the destruction of historical artifacts can in any way contribute to elephant protection is beyond me.

No doubt some people; those blessed with the intellectual acuity of the inanimate objects the'd sacrifice to their zealotry for instance, will dash out and burn that old hair brush great granny left them. But I will be very surprised if so much as a single pachyderm arises, phoenix-like, from the ashes of their vandalism.

However, in doing so they will undoubtedly contribute to the increasing rarity of ivory items held in private hands. 

As we all know, the rarer the item, the greater its value invariably becomes. Ivory will always be in demand, simply because it is rare, because it carves beautifully and because  it does not degrade as many other natural materials are apt to.

The rarer these vandals make historical relics with their self-indulgent reactionary symbolism, the more value those who admire such objects will place on those that remain.  

Thus the greater the motivation among suppliers and poachers eager to get their cut of a limited resource that's value, both monetary and as symbol of status, has been pushed through the roof by abolitionists. 

The community has turned its back on many forms of contraband over the years and the State destroys thousands of tonnes of it annually, yet never to my knowledge has the production of anything ever been arrested by this process. 

To the contrary, whether it is illegal guns, meth or even gin, destroying supplies simply drives up the cost of that which slips through the net.

The trade in rhino horn is a case in point. It is illegal, except among those cultures and individuals that believe it promotes virility. 

Not only do most people know it does no such thing, but even though there are comparatively inexpensive drugs that really do deliver the desired result, enough folks still think rhino horn is superior that rhinos are even more endangered than elephants.

Surely having formulated a substance that delivers on its promises and having made it available at a mere fraction of the cost of more traditional 'tonics', rhino numbers should be exploding across Africa? 

The fact that people such as you and I wouldn’t dream of having any rhino products in the home makes no contribution whatsoever to the preservation of rhino in the wild, nor will it, for as long as some people are wedded to their belief that rhino horn works.

It requires a level of naive stupidity that defies description to believe any cultural shift can be embraced by a percentage of the world’s population sufficient to end all interest in rhino horn and thus stop the trade in its tracks.

Just one or two traders with enough cash up-front and an eye to the future would be sufficient to wipe out the worlds remaining rhinos in very short order. 

The same can be said of ivory.  

Ivory collectors do not generally trade in the classifieds. They trade within their own very exclusive networks and like dealers in illegal drugs and arms, they rarely hang out shingles inviting the public to nip inside and peruse their stock.

Elephants numbers are sufficiently diminished that the commitment of just a couple of well connected dealers is all that's required to wipe out the elephant. Such people do not deal in second-hand trinkets or museum pieces. They want sell large pieces that exude prestige to a select clientele. 

Meanwhile, around the world, simpletons emote a warm fuzzy balm around their oh-so delicate sensibilities, by advocating the destruction of incredibly beautiful artworks and crafts left to us by our forebears, and through us, to generations to come.

Some zealots even believe the ivory of mammoths, the bulk of which died of natural causes between 140,000 and 60,000 years ago, should also go to the flames.

This is nothing more than shallow emotional symbolism.

Ivory, like gold, is all but useless for practical purposes. Its value lies in its beauty and more particularly, its rarity. 

It is an idea and despite the best efforts of the Church and various miscellaneous dictatorships throughout history, no idea has ever been destroyed by burning rare and beautiful works of art, be they as spectacular as the ornately craved hilt of an ancient samurai sword, or as diminutive as granddad's old pipe.

Anyway, I'll get outaya way now...

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THE INSIDIOUS SCOURGE OF RADICALISATION

As is the case for most reasoning people I’m sure, the issue of ‘radicalisation’ concerns me deeply.

Once radicalised by the proponents of an extremist doctrine, extremists will stop at nothing to impose their ideology on everyone.

Their tools for achieving this end are many, including dividing communities into groups of 'us' and 'them', abuse of the right of free speech to achieve that end, and the corrupt manipulation of various other democratic freedoms and processes too.

Those who oppose their will are treated to a relentless stream of disparaging rhetoric contrived to dehumanise the ‘unbeliever’, portraying them as wicked people to be shunned by a community of the devout.

They distrust government to the point of paranoia, seeing some dark intent behind every decision and process and they have no respect for the servants of government unless they subscribe to the same extremist ideology as their own.

Extremists are not born, they are manufactured. They are indoctrinated with an unrelenting stream of one-eyed, intolerant, extremist hyperbole and it would be a great mistake to assume this applies only to radical Islam.

In Jumping the Gun [Letter, Bay Post/Moruya Examiner, December 18th] we read the allegation Eurobodalla Councillors are pushing some corrupt hidden agenda that can be addressed only by a regime change of true believers.

The community is coerced to take a certain view, that the presence of HuntFesters will deny the community access to facilities for 7 years. In fact HuntFest occupies the facilities in question for only one long-weekend a year, during which the community is invited to attend.

Perhaps most bizarrely, the community is again advised that the failure of Council to bend to the will of a tiny fraction of the community responding to a survey – approx 85% of 166 respondents – amounts to a failure of the democratic process.

Democracy is not a tool for the oppression of minorities. In fact it assures their right to exist and to conduct their legal activities without fear of constant harassment and vilification, which in the past has included references to not wanting “people like that in our beautiful Eurobodalla”.

It has been estimated that at least 2000 supporters of radical Islam currently call Australia home.  Are we to believe their attitudes and actions speak for the entire Australian community?

Or do we simply acknowledge that the views of 2000 radicalised ideologues – as with the 0.4 of 1% of Eurobodalla residents opposing HuntFest in the much misrepresented consultation – represents only the views of a tiny fraction of the community sufficiently obsessed with their ideology to quite predictably and always angrily rattle their sabres?

Such people do not speak for the community. In fact, they do not even speak for the majority of Greens, many of whom grow increasingly concerned about the extremists within their ranks.

As our population grows, so the number of people radicalised under a variety of symbols and battle cries will also grow. This is inevitable!

Also inevitable is the fact their places of worship – their meetings and rallies – are doomed to poor attendance and their manipulative, often paranoid propaganda will continue to be rejected by a community intent on resisting radicalisation in all its manifestations.

Anyway, I'll get outaya way now...


Jumping the gun

Letters to the Editor

Bay Post/Moruya Examiner

December 18th, 2015

The Eurobodalla Greens are shocked a further five-year licence for the Narooma HuntFest looks likely to be issued whilst the current licence has two years to run.

The licence, controversially awarded in 2012, expires in 2017. In September HuntFest organisers applied for a renewal for the period 2018-2022. They have been told Eurobodalla Shire Council will process the application in February/March 2016.

You would have thought, with sensitivity around this issue, the council would stick to due process. The renewal of a five-year licence so far in davance [sic] renders the council liable once again to legal challenge.

If issued, the licence locks out the community from that venue until after 2022.  It holds a gun to the heads of the next elected councillors, who will be unable to re-visit the issue for the full term of their election.

HuntFest has realised a less sympathetic council will be elected next year, so the only option was to go early. The council needs to acknowledge the cynical, undemocratic and questionably legal nature of the application and tell HuntFest to wait their turn until early 2017.

The Eurobodalla Mayor’s announcement last week that an independent audit committee had found the council acted correctly in granting the license and that the agreement was watertight is meaningless.

The initial licence made no reference to guns and ammunition, yet through amendment creep, such sales are permitted.

If the council had determined to refuse the sale of weapons on public land the same audit committee could have easily supported that position as well.

When the people were formally and directly asked about guns and ammunition sales they mostly said NO. At this point, on this issue, what  the councillors “feel” is not relevant.

What the community has said must prevail.

Otherwise, why bother to ask?

Nick Hopkins

Convenor, Eurobodalla Greens

[ends]

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DEMOCRACY, THE ADLER AND BIRTH CONTROL

My disdain for online petitions is no secret among those who know me. Digital petitions indulge ignorance, facilitate instant gratification through the expression of gross intolerance and are prone to manipulation by the unscrupulous.

Once upon a time, the petitioner was tasked to demonstrate some commitment to his/her cause by canvassing "the average right-thinking man or woman in the street".  Those approached could ask questions, while the petition’s peddlers would also be exposed to the views of a more-or-less random sampling of people and their opinions on the petition’s thrust.

Online petitions, on the other-hand, require little or no commitment on the part of the petitioner, beyond the willingness to outline an objection or gripe.

Petition facilitators such as Change.org, Get-Up and Communityrun, to name but a few, will then disseminate one’s plea using their databases to target, not “the community”, but those members of it who’ve previously demonstrated a propensity for signing similar petitions.

These facilitators are essentially mass marketing companies exploiting the bourgeoning outrage economy.

The signatory’s email address, which serves as a unique identifier in lieu of the traditional signature, along with other information such as one’s postcode, is then used to track and record the individual’s political persuasions, their likes and dislikes, so that invitations to sign similar petitions may be issued.

This has seen petition signing develop into something of a hobby or crusade among some, especially the marginalised and disaffected who derive a sense of personal empowerment from supporting or opposing causes they have little knowledge of and perhaps no personal stake in at all.

An example of this was seen in a petition launched in 2014 in an attempt to derail an annual outdoors and hunting expo held in the small rural NSW township of Narooma.

The petition, much vaunted as evidence of overwhelming community opposition to HuntFest, garnered the support of some 40,000 signatories, 34,000+ of which, it was later revealed, were not residents of Australia or its territories.

This did not stop the petitioners presenting their ‘evidence’ to their local Council’s  Greens representative, who proudly tabled it before her fellow Councillors as undeniable proof of the breadth of opposition to HuntFest....in Patagonia, Israel, Finland and possibly the planet Alderaan.

This sort of manipulation is as commonplace as it is unprincipled. So much so, that one might even suggest it is intrinsic to the digital petition phenomenon. 

Take for instance the more recent case of a petition opposing the importation/ownership of the much publicised and oft misrepresented Adler lever-action shotgun.

The nature of the petition warrants no exploration here, but its legitimacy as a reflection of genuine community concern does.

Following the usual emotive and non-sequitur concerns linking the Adler to Port Arthur, the text goes on to state, “We, the people of Australia” in not one but two locations. 

However, there is absolutely nothing to prevent residents of Inner Mongolia being counted among “the people of Australia” who ostensibly support the petitioner’s demands.

I know this, because I signed it using a typically Mongolian name, email address and even a legitimate Inner Mongolian postcode i.e. 162800 (Heilongjiang).

Despite containing two digits more than any Australian postcode can boast, the petition’s systems thanked me for my support, advised me that by providing my email address I agreed to receive other campaign emails from Get-Up and Communityrun, and registered me as the petition’s 11,646th supporter.

It did likewise when I signed it "Rolf Harris", providing the email address rolf@hermajestyspleasure.co.uk and the London postcode WC2E 9RZ. 

So much for “We, the people of Australia”.

At issue also is the level of informed support the petition has garnered, even amongst actual Australians.

Samantha Lee, the face of Gun Control Australia and
many believe as much as 10% of its total membership

Take for instance the face of Gun Control Australian, Ms Samantha Lee, who was among those asked to speak at a recent press conference promoting the petition's 'success'. 

Others in attendance included David Shoebridge, firearms spokesperson for the political cult known as the Greens, and Labor MP Dr Hugh McDermott.

During her address to the assembled media, Ms Lee, doubtless a proud petition signatory herself, proceeded to relate a number of concerning ‘facts’ about the Adler, which together constituted grounds for deep community concern.

Every single one of those 'facts' was wrong!

Let me be very clear here. I do not mean Ms Lee's ‘facts’ were open to dispute or interpretation on irrelevant technicalities. I mean they were fundamentally wrong, in much the same way it is fundamentally wrong to suggest Buggies have gills and thrive in the home aquarium.

Ms Lee’s false claims include, but are not by any means restricted to, the following:

“The Adler has a magazine attached. No other lever-action firearms have a magazine attached.” 

False!  With a few rare and mostly antique exceptions, all lever-action firearms have a magazine attached.

“The Adler has a pistol grip!” (inferring it could be easily cut down and concealed.)

False!  The Adler has a pistol grip in precisely the same way a goldfish has a pistol grip i.e. not at all.

“This lever-action is quite advanced technology!”

False!  The lever-action has been about for some 130 years and available in Australia for at least 100 of those. Nor is the Adler the first and only lever-action shotgun available in Australia. Its current popularity is due almost exclusively to its affordability compared to similar lever-action shotguns already available and present in Australia since Adam played fullback for Jerusalem.

The point is, Ms Lee is a self-styled gun control advocate and lobbyist who either knows nothing about the item she seeks to have banned and is thus creating unwarranted community concern with her falsehoods, or she has the level of knowledge one expects of an responsible lobbyist, but is willing to deceive the public in order to contrive a desired outcome.

Either way, her statements were unprofessional, deceptive and highly unethical. The SSAA's response to Samantha Lee's various deceptions may be viewed here

Ms Lee is typical of the people who, via social media and other networks, have encouraged “the community” to sign an online petition, which itself provides next to no technical information about the Adler.

This begs the question, can the petition be considered the product of informed support or is it simply a reflection of fear resulting from ignorance and deception?

There appears to be a growing belief that democracy is a process by which a majority may stop or ban a thing by simple weight of ill-informed and irate numbers. Democracy is in fact a doctrine of tolerance and diversity, of respecting differing lifestyles, cultures and informed points of view.

Democracy is not a weapon by which we might rid ourselves of things that frighten us. Rather, it is a philosophy that strives to ensure the individual’s freedom to abstain from such things.

So who checks the integrity of these petitions to ensure they’re not fudged?

Who ensures that this petition, so proudly presented to Parliament by David Shoebridge, is an expression of the will of “We, the people of Australia” and not the people of Inner Mongolia?

How do decision-makers ensure that support for a cause was not garnered by way of false and misleading information and what does the scrutiny of many thousands of electronic petitions annually, cost the Australian taxpayer?

Finally, the reasonable expectations of the petition’s signatories would also appear dubious, as the following comment left by a petition signatory - one ‘Joanne D’ - clearly demonstrates:

“I was in hospital having my first child when Port Arthur massacre happened and I want to ensure it is never repeated.”

However one chooses to interpret Joanne D's impassioned comment, one thing is certain. The Adler lever-action shotgun was not the weapon responsible for either misadventure.

Anyway, I’ll get outaya way now...

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SEMI-AUTOMATIC PLACEBO-POLICY

I miss my semi-automatic rifles. It could never be said that I ‘needed’ a semi-auto, but there’s comfort in the knowledge that if the hunter's first shot fails to kill cleanly, there’ll be a mercy round waiting right behind it.

Those who pine for the “good ol’ days” may scoff, but I have often thought there are legitimate grounds to lobby for at least a 2-shot semi-automatic capacity, on animal welfare grounds alone.

It could hardly be argued rationally that the capacity to fire 2 shots in two seconds represents a significant additional risk to public safety.

But there I go, assuming, wrongly, that logic plays a role in decision-making processes relating to firearms.

We were not deprived of our semi-autos on rational public safety grounds. Rather, we were emoted out of them by a combination of knee-jerk panic and cynical expediency.

The deed is now done and I personally doubt we’ll ever see a return to the good ol’ days, despite the determined efforts of some very fine lobbyists.

In fact, I sometimes wonder if it serves our cause well to actively pursue the return of semi-autos, given that doing so, perhaps more than anything else, services the antis’ claims that shooters are irresponsible nutcases who will never be satisfied until they’ve wound-back gun control.

The key to understanding why we are unlikely ever to see the return of semi-autos, lies in understanding why we lost them in the first place.

Martin Bryant chose to carry out his slaughter with two semi-automatic rifles, resulting in 35 dead and 23 wounded.

Immediately the cry went up, “Somebody has to do sumfink!” and so somebody – specifically a Prime Minister in need of a quick fix for his appallingly low public approval rating – did the most simplistic 'something' possible. He banned the sorts of arms that, to the novice, appeared most akin to those used by Bryant.

This drew immediate and broad public support, not because it passed as a sound solution to the massacre syndrome, but because the public had absolutely nothing whatsoever to lose by the ban, and a perception of increased personal safety to gain.

In short, the strategy was widely applauded because the things Howard proposed banning belonged to other folks, not ‘me’.

Government can introduce even the most ludicrous policy, by which no-one can possibly benefit, provided the majority believes said policy poses no detriment to them.  And when it comes to firearms policy, few notions can be counted more ludicrous than the belief that banning semi-automatic arms has prevented a repeat of Port Arthur.

I call it the “Proud Tack Theory” (PTT). The belief that when faced with a tack that needs driving home, the handyman who doesn’t own a tack-hammer, will cry, “Drat, foiled again!” and simply leave the tack standing proud rather than taking to it with a handy claw-hammer.

Of course when a person has a job to do, he is likely to use the most efficient tool at his disposal, but the absence of the perfect tool for the job will not prevent a person improvising.

Considered logically and objectively, removing semi-automatic arms from the options available to the budding mass-murderer simply forces him to re-categorise his toolkit, upgrading the humble bolt action to the status of ‘best tool’ in lieu of a preferred option.

To believe the past 20 years of calm is in any way associated with a prohibition on semi-automatic arms requires a huge leap of faith, one which a desperate public, with absolutely no stake in retaining access to such arms, is more than willing to make in absolute desperation as opposed to considered wisdom.

As we are constantly reminded by the likes of the media and the Greens, the big problem with semi-automatic arms is their capacity to fire at the rate of 1 shot per second.

Theoretically, then, provided the aspiring psychopath can find a suitable captive audience – a school or a theatre for example – he can hope to kill 30 people in, say, 45 seconds, allowing generous wriggle-room for magazine changes.

A bolt action rifle, on the other hand, can discharge at a rate of approximately 1 shot every 2 seconds in skilled hands, 3 seconds in the hands of a psychopathic novice shooter. Let’s be generous and call it 30 shots in 70 seconds.

Of course magazine capacities have also been diminished since Port Arthur and as I’m certain our aspiring mass murderer is a law abiding soul, he’ll need to reload more frequently than once was the case.

However, being the boy-scout type who’s always prepared, he’ll have a pocket full of clips to resort to, each one requiring a break of around 3 seconds to replace. Let’s be generous and call it 5 seconds or a total of 30 additional seconds to reload.

That gives us a very generous period of 90 seconds to discharge 30 shots.

Bryant killed or wounded a total of 58 people in the first 300 seconds (5 minutes) of the Port Arthur massacre.  Clearly he could have accomplished the same total with a bolt action firearm, with time to break for a thick-shake.

The fact that he chose a semi-automatic was simply a case of a person selecting his preferred tool from his kit, which he then proceeded to use very-very inefficiently.

The belief that the psychopath can be comprehensively thwarted simply by forcing him to operate a bolt action is nothing short of idiotic and explained in these terms it is surprising just how many people will agree.

However, the logic is rarely explored in these terms and because most Australian’s have no stake whatsoever in gun ownership of any kind, they are content to applaud the introduction of placebo-policy, if only because it affords them the feeling of greater security.

Invariably some will demand to know how gun owners explain the 20 years of grace we’ve enjoyed since the 1996 buyback, if the prohibition on rapid fire arms was without effect.

Senior Research Fellow with Griffith University’s Violence Research and Prevention Program, psychologist Dr Samara McPhedran has answered this question far more eloquently than I can hope to, and I encourage the reader to seek out her work.

In brief, however, Dr McPhedran’s research has found that many factors, including such things as the de-stigmatising of depression, the availability of improved mental health treatments, anti-suicide and domestic violence support initiatives, improved economic and employment conditions and so on, have all combined to support a trend that was already in decline when post-Port Arthur gun reform was introduced.

Of course her findings are disputed by gun control advocates, among them Simon Chapman, Professor of Public Health at the University of Sydney, and the somewhat dubiously elevated ‘Professor’ Philip Alpers.

But while such proponents of gun control may dispute claims that post-96 gun reform had little impact on Australia’s already falling rates of death by firearms, their arguments invariably centre on interpretations of data relating to suicides, and not the effectiveness, or otherwise, of our rapid-fire arms prohibitions.

This begs the question, how has the prohibition on rapid fire arms influenced suicide rates?

Are we to believe those intent on taking their own lives with firearms are deprived of motivation for want of the ability to shoot themselves a lot and quickly?

Anyone who has followed the ‘debate’ cannot help but notice that no one is able to explain how diminishing the rate of fire by approximately one half to 1 shot every 2 seconds, is such a profound inconvenience that it causes the unbalanced mind to reassess.

Still, the public remains convinced that banning rapid-fire arms is responsible for the past 20 massacre-free years and this brings me, finally, to the definition of the term ‘massacre’.

It is generally accepted that in order for multiple murder to qualify as a massacre, 5 lives must be claimed in a single event and the victims should have been selected more or less at random.

Is the public truly so intellectually disadvantaged as to believe the 1996 prohibition on semi-automatic and pump action firearms so thoroughly thwarted the diseased mind that in the past 20 years, not so much as a single deranged individual has felt sufficiently competent with a standard bolt action rifle to take just 5 lives before the police show up to decommission him?

The answer, I'm sad to say, is yes!

Anyway, I’ll get outaya way now...

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DIARY OF AN EXPERT BEEKEEPER

As regular readers are aware, my articles usually take the form of rebuttals aimed at exposing the emotive, non-sequitur and often offensive claims of those opposed to the legal activities of ethical hunters. 

Hunting, however, is not the only traditional activity I'm interested in. I engage in many other sustainable harvest activities and this can be said of many, if not the majority of hunters. 

It is not hunting alone, but a combination of pursuits including crafts, natural harvest and traditional husbandry techniques and so-on, that we hunters refer to as our culture.

I have recently been seduced by one such activity commonly practiced among hunters and homesteaders, which the likes of PETA would doubtless refer to as, "the wanton manipulation and unethical exploitation of another sentient species", to wit, beekeeping.

Since first succumbing to the Human Apivirus some six months ago, I have read every conceivable (and otherwise) beekeeping publication and I’ve purchased or cobbled together all the requisite beekeeping gear.  Thus, I am now an expert in the apiarists’ art.

The sound you hear in the background is that of pigs attempting to achieve launch velocity.

It’s relatively easy to become a honeybee expert, due largely to the fact bees evoke such all-pervading and irrational terror in 99.99% of the human population, that few are motivated to study them sufficient even to attain novice status.

Of course I aspire someday to become a guru, but it appears this venerable status is bestowed only upon those boasting more than one hive. This estate is known in the trade as an 'apiary', from the Latin ‘apiarium’ meaning beehive, and to everyone outside the trade as a, “Holy shit! Let’s get outa here!!”  

This is of course a loose translation from the Latin, but it nonetheless conveys a general working theme.

It also appears quite important that a proportion of the aspirational guru’s apiary should comprise hives of imaginative colour-schemes, highly unlikely shapes and questionable efficiencies.

Further, it would appear to be rather important that at least some of one’s hives contain actual bees and while expert owner of a shiny new, three-tier, ten-frame, full depth Langstroth bee hive I may be, it is, as yet, sadly untenanted.

There are two means by which one might seek to address such a fundamental dearth;

1. via purchase of a nucleus colony from a reliable purveyor of healthy, placid stock, or

2. by way of the relocation of ten-thousand or so members of a heavily armed vagrant army (AKA a swarm), which is motivated to protect its sovereign (the Queen) with the sort of implacable resolve of purpose that has been known to down light aircraft.

I chose option 2, which itself offers two possibilities;

a)  One can gather the swarm from a place it has chosen to temporarily take its ease before moving to permanent accommodation, thus relying on the dear little buzzers being too fagged-out after a long flap to mind being dumped unceremoniously into a box in preparation for the long journey home in a car boot, or 

b)  One can attempt to convince said angry bundle to take up residence, voluntarily, in a small temporary hive or ‘trap’ by means of a lure, later re-accommodating them in the hive proper.

It is largely for reasons of abject poverty that I chose option 2 b) – henceforth referred to, for the sake of brevity if not practicality, as the Cunning Lure Methodology or CLM. 

Claims the CLM is named for the Crazed Lunatic Minds likely to employ such a random technique, are spurious and offensive to some.

To accomplish the CLM, one needs an assortment of basic items, including a box of approximately 40-litres capacity, some frames fitted with a little beeswax to act as a foundation and guide, and of course the magical lure itself, commonly known as lemongrass oil.

Apparently, to the humble honeybee, lemongrass oil smells just like a Queen bee...or perhaps a pub...I confess the authoritative tomes are a little vague in that regard. Anyway, having all key components save the wondrous eau de Queen/boozer, I sallied forth in search.

As luck would have it, I discovered a 13mil bottle of this wondrous extract on a shelf in my local health-food store, where, as fate would have it, I was also tasked with my first test of commitment as a beekeeper.

The sole remaining bottle of lemongrass oil sat on a shelf right next to not less than two-dozen tiny bottles of Patchouli oil. Decisions-decisions!

On the one hand the prospect of attracting thousands of bees to my garden, who, in the fullness of time, would provide me with the glorious bounty of their labours, or, on the other hand, the Patchouli oil and the opportunity to attract thousands of people who’d ask me if I wanted to “pull a few cones, ma’an”  and eat all my choky bickies?

Resolve and advancing years prevailed and so I left the store with...well, that would be telling!

Some weeks earlier I’d let a friend in on the news I’d recently become an expert beekeeper and he’d announced, with some excitement, that he had a beehive in his shed I was welcome to have.  Oh joy! 

Next day he dropped by with a single eight-frame box that was so old the carpenter's mark was barely distinguishable as being that of one Jesus of Nazareth. 

Not to worry, battered, horribly split and separating at the dovetails though it was, it would nonetheless serve as a bee trap. 

So I dodgied-up a serviceable lid, bored entry and ventilation ports of the recommended sizes in the requisite locations, popped in some frames and put a small plastic bag in the bottom, into which I had placed a little tissue carrying a few drops of the precious.....yes, I bought the lemongrass oil. 

On August 20, 2015, I set the whole apparatus atop a two-metre(ish) post in my suburban backyard, taking care to face it north-east, while close-by I set an earthenware dish filled with water into which stones had been placed so’s to ensure access would not result in mass drownings and the predictable media frenzy that's apt to follow such tragedies. 

At this point I stood back to survey my efforts and await my quarry. 

My efforts were rewarded within hours...528 of ‘em to be precise, hours that is, not bees.

After just three-weeks of dogged observation, prayer and incantation, interspersed with bouts of despair and heavy drinking during which my cat requested a formal separation, the first signs of action occurred late in the afternoon of September 13th.

This action took the form of three bees, which began to ‘buzz’ the entrance of my cunning trap. After much frenetic attention that resulted in seemingly endless aborted approaches, one of the three entered my trap, while the other two continued to fly about the outside in ever decreasing clockwise circles.

After some time, the second of the three also landed on the entrance, but rather than going inside, she lingered a while just outside, clearly communicating with Bee-1 within.

Now, though I am not yet a guru, I do have a basic understanding of bee language and associated dialects as befits my expert status. Hence I was able to interpret the aforementioned initial communications thus; 

Bee-2: “So what’s it like in there anyway?” 

Bee-1: “Buggered if I know. Looks like the power’s out!” 

Bee-2 then took flight to convey this advice to Bee-3, who responded with the unmistakable contraclockwise concentric aerobatics which, in the patios common to bees, translates as, “Well that’s just typical!”

After some time inside the box, apparently bumping her head and stubbing her toes, to which I ascribe the occasional cries of “Oh bugga” and “Stupid place to put a bloody frame”, which could be heard clearly from outside, Bee-1 emerged from the darkness, with a slight limp, to communicate the results of her recce to Bee-2, before heading inside once more, no-doubt in hope of making some sense of the fuse-box.

Bee-2 then alighted from the entrance and began a heated conversation with Bee-3, which, I’m sorry to report, took place just out of earshot.

However, judging by her frenzied aerobatics and wild gesticulations, it wasn’t hard to tell Bee-3 was not a happy little prospective tenant.  She soon headed due-south (in a beeline as it were), I suspect in search of mobile-phone connectivity so she could call Essential Energy about having the power reconnected. Though it must be said, this much is sheer speculation on my part.

Soon after, Bee-2 joined Bee-1 inside the box, where the two lingered for some time. This fact may be cause to reassess the reason for Bee-3’s frantic gesticulations and huffy departure, but frankly, in this day and age, who am I to judge.

The scenario outlined above was repeated for three days, in more or less exactly the same form. I cannot recall reading in the literature any reference to such behaviour as a standard precursor to colonisation and I admit to feeling a tad resentful that my expert efforts to capture a swarm may have been wrongly interpreted as an invitation to frequent an apicultural bordello.

Nonetheless, I am resolved to leaving things as they are for a few more days at least, during which time, gentle reader, you may rest assured I will seek an opportunity to pull Bee-3 quietly aside for a little chat about the bees and the bees. 

I will do this not only due to my profound personal moral sense, but because it’s bad enough I’m not getting any bloody honey out of these hussies, without having to live with the fact at least two of them appear to be gettin' more action than I am!

Anyway, I'll get outaya way now...

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