Biscuit - The Drunken Bee.
Hanging precariously onto one thin solitary limb, on a bush beside my apartment door, sits a lone flightless bumblebee.
For seven days he's been sitting in the same exact spot. No manner of gentle prodding will get him to take flight. He simply hangs on for dear life, switching positions on occasions.
Once or twice, I've even seen this same bee receive a few fellow bumblebee visitors. By the fourth day of witnessing this strange phenomenon, I began to wonder what's wrong with the poor bumblebee, which my kids and I have so lovely named Biscuit.
* What's Wrong With Biscuit?
"What's wrong with him mommy?" - My eldest asks. I immediately assume that this poor specimen is either sick from pesticide spray, or maybe his wing is injured and he can't fly.
As I explain these two obviously logical explanations to my eldest, she immediately chimes in, "or maybe he's just too hot" - which is my cue that it's time to go inside the safe confines of our air conditioned apartment.
My interest is immediately peaked however. I have to solve this mystery.
I rush to my laptop and Goggle - "Why do bumblebees become flightless?" There wasn't much information available except for my two initial reasonings.
* I Have An Epiphany!
All of a sudden, I have an epiphany. In the far recesses of my mind, I vaguley remember reading that fermented nectar possesses the power to cause bees to fly into trees or simply fall to the ground, preventing them from finding their way back to their hive.
So is it possible, that our little Biscuit has succumbed to intoxication?
We have been experiencing some extremely hot weather around these parts lately. And if indeed he is intoxicated, from what I've read, drunken bees who do find their way back home face a further challenge - the wrath of guard bees determined to prevent the whole bee colony from becoming intoxicated as well.
In retrospect, that might explain Biscuit's fellow bee visitors the other day. Go figure!
* Who Knows?
Whether Biscuit the bumblebee has been overtaken by the "vapors" of bug spray; or was suffering from heat exhaustion; or through no fault of his own, has become inebriated from the taste of fermented nectar; we may never know.
All I know is, that at this very moment, Biscuit is still hanging precariously onto that one thin solitary limb on a bush, beside my apartment door.
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