The Last Ninja Beekeeper

Our strawberry patch doubles in size every year. What was once a manageable 10' x 10' square, is now threatening to overrun the east end of our garden. This is fine with me -- there is nothing like a bowlful of freshly-picked, juicy strawberries to start off the day.
The only problem is that "the yield" is way down. Healthy plants cover five times as much ground as when we started, but only produce twice as many berries. The latent cost-accountant inside me was worried. My know-it-all neighbor agreed.
"Looks like you'll have to pollinate them flowers yourself," he said with a suggestive leer. He paused long enough for my active imagination to envision a pre-dawn raid by the SWAT team from the unnatural-acts-to-the-plants division of the Department of Agriculture.
"Or," he continued, "you could get yourself some bees."
I knew that most beekeepers move their hives around to take advantage of a variety of blossoms and I knew my neighbor had some hives on his place. But I also knew my neighbor's ironclad reluctance to lend anything to a fellow neighbor, especially one in need. Clearly a case of the hives and the hive-nots.
At the time I wasn't in a position to make a major investment in hives, smokers, and other equipment. Luckily, the local phone book listed a Apiarian Society and I gave them a call.
"How many do you need?" the friendly voice asked.
"I don't know."
"Fair enough. The Society is having a demonstration this afternoon. Buzz on by and we'll talk about it."
How many bees would it take to pollinate a 10' x 50' berry patch? I'd seen bees in the garden before and they only spent a few seconds at any one flower. Each plant was about a foot apart, so I had 500 plants. If each plant had ten flowers, that was 5,000 flowers that needed pollinating.
When I allowed for travel time between flowers, nectar breaks, lunch hours and hallway gossip, I came up with an estimated 5,000 bee-minutes worth of work. My strawberry patch offered one bee about two weeks of steady employment, or if they preferred to work in teams (I didn't know) a two-bee team might finish in a week.
"There has got to be a Shakespeare pun in here somewhere," I droned as I dressed for the meeting, "Two bees or not two bees . . ."
I'd seen pictures of beekeepers before: pith helmet, veil, white coveralls, and gloves. I didn't have these things, and the lack reminded me of Thoreau's words, "Beware of all enterprises that require new clothes."
I wasn't setting myself up in the bee business, I just wanted to employ a few of them part-time. I threw together my own outfit from things in the closet -- trying to make a fashion statement. White was too bland. Black was better, more mysterious. The bees would keep their distance, I thought. I donned my black sweatsuit, tightened the hood drawstrings around my chin, strapped on my safety goggles, grabbed a match box to hold my bees, and headed for the door.
"Bruce Lee film retrospective in town?" my wife laughed.
Five seconds after I arrived at the Apiarian Society I sensed that few successful ninjas keep bees. It was a stinging sensation. Agitated bees hurled themselves at my goggles until their numbers blinded me. I fell to the floor under the weight of thousands of bees as they attacked my flailing arms. It seemed like forever before I was rescued in a billowing cloud of smoke that calmed my assailants.
When I came to and the swelling went down enough for me to hear someone else over the sound of my own screams, I was told that bees tend to sting dark objects. Reminds them of bears and other honey-stealers in the wild.
Which is why pollinating time at the Clear Creek Ranch strawberry patch will be calculated in knee-minutes and not bee-minutes. I bought an artist's brush and I'm working my way up and down the rows hunkered over on my knees, pollinating one tingling flower at a time.