"Swarm Season"

Faith standing next to a swarm trap.

As the days get longer and the temperatures get warmer, honeybee activities begin to increase as they prepare for the spring nectar flows. The bees are now beginning to build up their populations in order to have enough worker bees to gather the nectar. As the populations build up, some bee colonies increase their numbers very quickly and some individual hives may become overcrowded. These overcrowded conditions can stimulate a phenomenon called "swarming".

Swarming is part of the reproductive cycle in honeybees. Though honeybees reproduce individual bees through mating and egg-laying, swarming is how honeybees create new colonies. The process of swarming involves production of a new queen within an individual colony. When this queen emerges and is ready to take on the duties of a queen bee, the old queen (the new queen is now the queen of the old hive), along with approximately one-half of the workers in that colony, will leave the hive as a large mass of bees. This mass of bees will congregate on a tree limb, fence post or on a side of a building near the original hive. A congregation of bees in this manner is called a swarm. ( Some colonies will swarm several times, so some of these swarms will have new queens.)

While the bees are in this swarm, some workers are sent out to search for a suitable place to start a new hive. We call these particular workers "scouts". When some of the scouts have found a favorable site for a new hive (such as a hollow tree), they report back to the swarm and then the swarm leaves the swarming site to go to the new hive.

 Some of you may have the opportunity to find a swarm this spring. You may find a clump of bees that can range from about the size of a softball to as large or larger than a basketball. You may find them on a tree limb, in a shrub, on a fence post or on the side of a building. If you find a swarm, the best thing that you can do is leave it alone. Honeybees, that are in a swarm, are not aggressive because they have no hive to defend at this time. These bees, however, should only be handled by an experienced beekeeper.

Swarms may stay on a swarming site for as little as 15 minutes or for several days or more. It depends on the length of time it takes for the scouts to find a new hive. So when you see a swarm, keep in mind that they will not be on that site permanently.  deWayne and I have made several attempts in the same day to capture a swarm for a particular client who kept calling saying a swarm was on her bird bath.  By the time we arrived there were only a few bees on the ground under the bird bath. For two days we went back and forth trying to capture the swarm with no success.  The client feared that we would think she was crazy, so she texed us a photo by using her camera phone.  And had we not been educated in the swarming methods of honeybees, we may have considered the client crazy!

Spraying honeybee swarms with insecticide is not recommended for several reasons. First of all, even though the bees are not aggressive during swarming, you run the risk of getting stung if you try to spray them. Secondly, the bees are only going to be there for a short period of time, so spraying them will be a waste of your time. Finally, if the swarm is reachable, the bees are valuable to a beekeeper. If a swarm is found before it locates a new home, a beekeeper can capture the swarm and start a new hive with the bees.

The Vintage Bee Company would love the opportunity to service those in need of swarm removals.  You may contact us at:  912-429-3695 or 912-429-0759

deWayne & Faith Jaudon



Judges 14:8-9 (English Standard Version)

After some days he returned to take her. And he turned aside to see the carcass of the lion, and behold, there was a swarm of bees in the body of the lion, and honey. He scraped it out into his hands and went on, eating as he went. And he came to his father and mother and gave some to them, and they ate. But he did not tell them that he had scraped the honey from the carcass of the lion.