Will do that Cundald. JP, you are right about the design of that fire place, but, instead of ceramics, this hearth was cast iron cylinders, stacking on top one another. They used cement to grout the gaps, but somehow the gap at the second cylinder from the top down has no grout, and that was how the bees got in. I guees when they lighted the fire, all the bees that hanging inside the hearth were killed.
Michael, when you said" desensitized" , do you actually mean that the body will adapt just as vacination?