Found Poetry on Buried Bees

John Ptak arranged and re-arranged and “poemized” some text from an old agriculture publication about burying bees. I too found the title, Burying Bees, odd and fascinating and the post another reminder why I enjoy his blog of antiquarian finds.

With a few line breaks here and not there of my own, here it is:

Bees may be buried when flowers are gone,
and left until they come again.

Weak stocks may be wintered,
but they are usually more trouble than they are worth,
because they are annoyed and kept weak,
if not robbed by the stronger stocks,
and because they consume proportionally more honey to keep them warm.

While in the ground each bee eats its own allowance.

They are not annoyed by the mice,
nor disturbed by the changes of the weather
but really are at rest; nor is the expense much compared with preparing
and placing bees in a  room, or cellar, or watching out of doors,
following which we buried our stocks last winter.

—JF Ptak Science Books: Found Poetry on Buried Bees (1865)