Heffalump.

Went to Aberdeen Uni. – Zoology Dept. – for a seminar on bee sub-species identification. It’s a long drive there – and, seemed like a much longer one back.
 
The type of bee that is of interest is the British black bee which is, obviously, brown; its characteristics are defined by: hair length and position on the last segment of its abdomen and the pattern of veins on its wings. Other features such as: temperament, thriftiness and hardiness are rather more difficult to measure.
 
The measurable attributes are unreliable and someone passed the wry comment that it was like identifying a border collie: if it’s black and white it might be – but then again, it might be a penguin. DNA testing at a few hundred pounds a time is a tad expensive to use as part of a bee breeding programme so we have methods readily available that can tell us that we might have black bees, might tell us that we definitely haven’t, but cannot manage the “yes you do” statement.
 
Lunch was eaten in the museum underneath this skull of an Indian elephant; I have difficulty imagining how an elephant brain can fit in such a small cranium.