By Joshua Bright

If you encountered an Apis mellifera in a bad mood at Wave Hill this weekend, please forgive it. The garden's resident honeybees were forced to share their flowers and their hard-earned food with swarms of giant kazoo-blowing, yellow crepe paper-wearing imposters and their hungry parents.

The usual peaceful oasis of Bronx fauna and flora was a hive of buzzing activity on Saturday and Sunday for "Honey Weekend," and it all began with plundering the pantry of the bees.

"They don't seem to like that," said Wave Hill horticultural interpreter Charles Day through protective mesh headgear as he tried to gently brush a mass of bees off a honey-filled frame from the hive.

Before scores of curious eyes the next day, the same frames were lowered into a honey extractor. As the spinning golden goodness was centrifugally removed, Bronx beekeeper Roger Repohl spilled the bees' secrets to the demonstration's attendees. The precious nectar was then whisked into the hands of cook Julie Gale who created "Biblical nut balls with honey" on the sunlit lawn before drooling Homo sapiens of all ages. The worker bees looked menacingly on.

Meanwhile in the herb garden, delicate flowers swaying seductively in the cool breeze were suddenly rocked by the hurricane of laughing and dancing children in full insect regalia. The tiny flying foragers were foiled from replenishing their supplies.

Behind the stone walls of Wave Hill House, participants of the candle-making workshop rolled sheets of colored, honeycomb textured beeswax into ... sticks for burning! The drones were surely fuming.

Yet, when Sunday afternoon rolled around, not a drop of honey went to waste and not a single sting was reported.