same fortress as my previous facepalm:
having lost 2 beekeepers to ambushes already, i decided to try again but this time burrowing my beekeeper and setting some of the hives to only be used for splitting, removing the need to go hunt the map for a new batch of bees. everything went well and eventhough my beekeeping experiment was rather small-scale, my dwarves could enjoy the ocasional mead.
then an ambush of crossbow goblins popped up and started raining death on my pastures and outside farms from higher ground. not to loose any dwarves i made a new burrow which didn't include my outside 'safe' zone (area outside my fortress, used for trading, farming, herding and beekeeping, protected by a heavily trapped entrance tunnel but unfortunatly not as safe as i would like since it's in a valley) having no clear shot at anything, the ambush proceeds to my entrance tunnel and meets its end at my dodge-trap. only lives lost were a stray bunny and a pet cavy sow. life returns to normal, then suddenly "ambush! curse them!" "Urist McBeekeeper has died" zoom to location => other side of the mountain
mental note = setting civilian alert to restrict to a burrow overrides all previous burrowing. removing the restriction does not reset those to their previous settings. Urist McBeekeeper was free to roam the map in search of bees and gobling surprises.
beekeeping suspended until a better solution can be found... no mead for my dwarves.
ps: how big does your beefarm have to be to produce sufficient honey for atleast some consistent mead production? i had 10 hives which produced about 5 honeycombs in the 2 years of active beekeeping? 2 years and 3 dwarves for ~25 units of mead seems hardly worth it.