Hello, friends!
What a surprise this morning when I received a text telling me that our bees had swarmed! I’m going to emphasize the “surprise” part of the sentence above as we saw no overt signs that a swarm was imminent. A few of us at Skidompha regularly take “bee breaks” to sit for a minute and watch the little critters as they work, and we have not seen any of the usual signals of imminent swarm—queen cells at the edges of the frames, overcrowding, piping, whistles, or honking. It caught us off guard. (A more detailed inspection of hive shows queen cells at the top of the second frame on the right-hand side of the hive. MG)
The swarm hung around for much of the day on their perch but have since left. They are quite docile during their swarm as they do not have a home to protect during that time. Worker bees flew off in search of a favorable spot for a new hive—location is everything in real estate, even with bees—and flew fly back to the swarm to communicate their findings through dance. Promising spots elicit, dynamic, Taylor-Swift-backup-dancer quality dancing, while the “meh” spots are conveyed through something similar to how I dance at a wedding. It’s not good.
Our hive upstairs is quiet now with roughly only half of the original population left. There are many capped brood and drone cells however so I expect them to bounce back stronger than ever.
One other note before I go, We are having our Summer Read opening day party and signup next Saturday, June 7th. Please come down and join fun, and get your bingo card!
Be well,
Matthew
Matthew Graff
Executive Director
Skidompha Public Library