G’Day FROM MELBOURNE Oh how our lives have been turned upside down since the arrival of COVID-19. One day we were all smiles and next day we’re all wearing masks. Remember the time when you couldn’t go into a courthouse, a bank or for that matter almost everywhere wearing a mask? We are all hidden behind masks nowadays that reminds us of the nasty part of life, such as gangsters, bank robbers and I.S.I.S. When I migrated to Australia I remember being amazed by the friendly greeting kiss on the cheek by the fairer sex. Now the friendly kiss and the warm handshake is only a memory of an era stolen by COVID-19. I am not an authority on whether a mask should or should not be worn but I have a problem as to how wearing one is affecting a lot of people. I know there are divisive views on this but when it comes to people like me who have only one lung, and my wife who is asthmatic, when we have to restrict our breathing port holes, it doesn’t make sense. Our home has no boundary and is only two meters from a beautiful lake that is home to lots of wildlife and native birds. I assume we can’t give or get COVID-19 from our feathered and fluffy friends. So it don’t make sense for me to be wearing a mask and scaring the living daylights out of my native friends, even if they occasionally poop on my veranda. It is now 1.30pm on Friday February 12th as I continue to write this article and the news has been broken by the Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews, locally described as Dictator Dan, that the State goes back into Stage 4 lockdown as from 11.55pm tonight. What Stage 4 means for us is we are only allowed out of home to exercise for two hours a day, shop only for essentials, travel no further than 5kms from home. Again our liberty has been stolen from us, by a man that can’t be trusted in charge of quarantine in the State. I better kick on from all this doom and gloom and talk about my regular friends in lockdown. In late September last year, a pair of swans took up residence in the lake outside our kitchen door. We watched as they nourished their newly hatched brew some weeks later. Last week our swans and their brew of six, now fully grown, sadly flew off and left us. As swans pledge for life, we expect them to return again next year to do the same thing again, I hope. They have been replaced by some shags who seem to do a lot of fishing and are quite funny as they toss their catch in the air so the head of the fish goes down the throat first. I remember going to the circus many 54 | THE IRISH SCENE
years ago in Cork and don’t remember the jugglers being as accurate as the shags are, I haven’t seen the shags drop one of their catches yet. Recently I had the non-native Indian myna birds removed from our property because they attack all the other birds that occupy our garden. Their removal has now cleared the way for the return of the blue robins that went missing because they were regularly attacked and killed by the mynas. The robins are amazing birds, they are so active and agile considering their size. At the moment we have two families of them staying in the garden rent free with an abundance of insects to feed on. Adding to the menagerie of ducks, water hens and pukeko swamp hens, we have also taken two hives of 40,000 bees. Yep I will forgive you for thinking that we are stone mad. If you’d told me last year that 80,000 bees would be sharing the same garden as us, I would have told you that you were mad. Well guess what, I’m surprised to be learning so much about such an important process that gives us the magic that is honey. Another few things I’ve learned about my tiny hard-working friends, is that they only live for about 37 days. They survive longer in winter when they don’t leave the hive to work, due to rain, snow and cold. The Queen Bee can live for 6 to 7 years, that’s assuming she doesn’t get dethroned before then. I learned the hard way how to defend myself against being stung, but let me first tell you the mistakes I made, when I decided to trim a hedge near the hive. I tried to be as quiet as a mouse, so as not to disturb them, I was doing fine for a while until one of the 80,000 decided to pay me an in-your-face visit. Cordially I whisper hallow, he then must have thought, aha I have just caught a thief before he got to our honey pot. The penny dropped as soon as he started to buzz around by ear and I began to wave my hands to swat him off. My waving actions, I learned later, was like waving a red flag to a bull, in bee language. I soon found myself confronted by a swarm of bees, as the little coward no doubt called for backup. I immediately discovered I could run at a pace that I never thought achievable before. Once in the safety of home, I stood at the window and looked out at the swarm of my attackers and I would almost swear I could hear them calling out ‘Come out here you big ugly bear and fight”. I have always believed in a fair fight one on one, however a swarm of bees against
