While Ken and Cheri took the three older boys to Whole Foods, Chipotle, and the laundrymat, Phil and I planted the ten crabapple trees. I had originally purchased them for pollination, but they didn't fit well into the orchard, so we're using them as decoration, more or less. Eight peach trees left to plant, plus 20 trees on their way. We have to chip the final large brush pile before those peaches can go in the ground, so Phil spent a few hours doing that, until his arms vibrated of their own accord. (Well, maybe not quite.)
Yesterday's sting on my wrist caused my whole forearm to swell. In the future, I'll remember to scrape the stinger out, not pinch it (pinching pushes more venom into the skin). And I'll hope to have any stings through clothes, since I think they are less intense.
I spent a good bit of time trying to figure out how to help my poor bees. The banker's box of bees was humming aggressively when I picked it up this morning. After much thought, I wondered if the bees swarmed because they had chosen too small a section of hive for the doubled amount. I decided to expand the section where the bees had stayed, and then dump the swarm in the opposite end of the top bar hive, with two dividers between them, and an open section with the entrance. I hoped that would allow the bees to gradually become friendly again before combining entirely.
I dumped the swarm in, and checked in occasionally. At one point, I almost despaired, as the bees that remained had abandoned their perfect comb altogether, to advance to meet the returned swarm.
At another point, a smaller swarm of bees clustered on the outside of the hive.
But after much prayer, and a bit of patience, I think that all ends well, at least for today. Some bees returned to the comb. Some bees stayed in the newly opened section. Will they combine? Peacefully coexist? It remains to be seen.
Friday, April 30, 2010
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Hello,
ReplyDeleteYou don’t know me, but I found your blog while searching the internet for some grass pictures. Your blog came up as one of the google search results, and so I happened to stumble upon your bee post from several years ago. I’m not sure if you ever found answers to your questions, and I know it has been quite some time since you posted about them - but I thought I’d post in case you hadn’t, in hopes that you might find it helpful.
All European honeybees (and all social bees for that matter) create new colonies naturally by swarming – we do have native solitary bees which don’t live in colonies, and play by their own rules. Once the honeybee colony has become large enough to sustain a swarm, the worker bees tending to the larvae will begin feeding royal jelly to some young to create a new queen or two. Once the new queen comes out, one of the queens will take a small portion of the colony with her to start the new one. The other queen will remain to run the existing colony.
Occasionally bees will completely abandon a hive for some reason or another. This is different from natural swarming. If they do abandon a hive, it doesn’t mean that they have outgrown the hive (some of the hive will swarm and leave if this happens – like yours did), but it means there is likely a problem there that we humans aren’t aware of. Perhaps something has changed in the environment so it is not a suitable location any more, perhaps there is a virus or bacteria invaded the colony, perhaps it had been attacked by parasites or predatory wasps…either way, if the hive has been abandoned, its best to assume that there is a reason, and the bees know best. It’s possible that dumping the swarm back into its mother colony could also stimulate the bees to abandon their home. The confusion and disruption of this natural swarming process could cause such confusion and disorder that they all leave.
It’s also worth mentioning that bees are disappearing at an alarming rate across the world, and they are now federally protected. As our most efficient and most important pollinator, we wouldn’t have the fruits and vegetables without them. Believe it or not, it is actually illegal to dispose/destroy honey bees that are not posing any immediate threat to humans. Even if they have set up shop in an inconvenient or unwanted location, many pest companies will have the hive removed and relocated.
As far as swarming goes, the swarming queen will take with her the workers she needs to start a new colony. The new swarm will only fly about 50-100 feet away from the mother colony, and land to wait. They usually land on tree branches, but will also commonly land anywhere else – a mailbox, the side of a building, or even the ground – nowhere is off limits. Since the queen is rather large and not a very good flyer, they will land nearby and all the workers will surround the queen to protect her while a few scout bees search the area for a suitable new home. This searching process can take anywhere from 1 hour to a few days, either way the bees will leave on their own once a new home has been found to move in to their new diggs.
Swarming is a natural process and is a good sign of a healthy growing hive. Since you mentioned that you have trees on your property that you need pollinators for, it might be a good idea to set up new empty hives around your property to encourage any future swarms to move in and stay working on your trees for you. You can encourage bees to move in a new hive by also placing a bar with some old comb on it.
I hope you find this information helpful and good luck with your bees in the future. If you have any more questions about bees, try contacting a local bee-keeper. I find that bee-keepers are always excited to share information to anyone who will listen.
Regards,
Rose Holmes