Friday we could see bees flying everywhere in the yard next door. Then they disappeared. We didn’t know where they had come from or where they had gone.
Then yesterday, Saturday, a neighbor whose back yard abuts our back yard came to say there was a huge "bee hive" in one of the trees near our common fence line... and the bees were invading her house. We all tromped out to the back yard to look at the "bee hive". There, in our ancient little apple tree, at eye level, was a football size dark brown humming mass of bees. A swarm had settled there, surrounding their queen, hunkering down for the night.
more over the fold:
Swarming is how bees reproduce when a hive gets too big. After filling their bee bellies with honey to fortify themselves they set out with the old queen to find a new home. More than half of the colony usually goes with her. If the Queen dies enroute the rest will also die and there will be no new hive. If the weather takes a sudden turn for the worse during a swarm it may also mean their demise. Swarming usually occurs over a 1 to 2 day period: a new home is needed fairly quickly for survival.
Through serendipity, Tom, my partner, had recently met an amateur bee keeper who lived nearby. So Tom phoned and offered Dave the beekeeper a nice new swarm. A half hour later I was a surprised to see this grey haired man in shorts and sandals, and NO protection whatsoever, at our door. He came with just a white portable hive, a few utensils that looked like scrappers, and 2 small grandchildren. He neatly scrapped most of the bee "football" into the box... in one fell swoop, then gently transferred a few of those left behind in his bare hands and held them in front of the box: the bees didn’t sting him, but went marching right in, like good little bees. (The smallest grandson piped up with the observation that they were just like soldiers...) Dave estimated that this swarm contained about 20,000 bees.
Dave left the portable hive there till after dark, thereby insuring that almost all the bees would be tucked in bed for the night before he returned to pick it up. He brought us a jar of his honey when he came back, which we tested on some toast with butter...and found it to be good.
Not sure if Tom told Dave that he too had tried to scoop up bees with his bare hands and get them into the box while Dave was gone... and that it resulted in 5 stings. (Tom later confirmed that he did not tell Dave) We decided that Dave was a bee whisperer and Tom was not.
Tom also noted that the bees were warm, which I thought was an interesting observation. Turns out that a bee's body temperature is anywhere between 25oC and 38oC... (or 77oF -100.4oF)...even in winter, amazing.
With full awareness of how precious our honey bees are and the dangers they face from colony collapse disorder (see recent diary by FishOutofWater: http://www.dailykos.com/...
To see a few pictures and learn a little more about swarming: http://en.wikipedia.org/...
This recounting is offered to the spirit of the bees and the bee whisperer.