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FEATURE

The Swarm Part 3 of 4

By Allen Cosnow, DVM

one knows whether the swarm has a leader. It The swarm advances this way for a few yards, or for hundreds of
No has been suggested that there might be some yards, until it comes to some object (as far as anyone can tell it is a

worker, indistinguishable from the others, who
random choice) – a limb or trunk of a tree, a shrub, a post, the eaves
carries out that function. At any rate, if there is of a house – and one at a time each bee lands there. Finally, a cluster
a leader at all, it certainly it isn't the queen herself; she is often one weighing as much as six pounds is formed. It may be that the im-
of the last to leave the hive, and besides, she doesn't see well. mediate purpose of forming the cluster is to be sure that the queen
Generally, swarming begins between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. A few is present; sometimes for one reason or another it happens that she
workers fly out, but they don't go far. They fly around close to the is not. In that case the bees soon become aware of it, break up the
hive, back and forth, while they await the others. More and more cluster, and return to the hive. But most of the time she is with
bees come out, and the swarm continues to enlarge until it fills a them, and the swarm remains clustered there with the bees clinging
sphere about twenty feet in diameter in the air around the hive. This to one another. Mean- while, scouts are sent to explore the area to
takes about 15 minutes. Somewhere in this cloud of twenty or thirty find a suitable place to start a new home. The rest remain there tran-
thousand bees – 40 to 60 percent of the population – is the queen. quilly waiting.
When all that are going to take part in the swarm are present, the This is another time when people become frightened – seeing a
swarm leaves. big cluster of bees hanging from a branch – but again, having no
The swarm starts to move slowly through the air, while each in- real home, the bees have little propensity to sting. Moreover, before
dividual bee flies back and forth inside it. Those who are unfamiliar leaving the hive each bee had filled her stomach with enough honey
with the life of bees are often frightened by the sight of a swarm in to last for as much as seven days if necessary, and having a stomach
the air (thinking it must be an attack squadron), but in reality, this is full of honey it is difficult for her to assume the curved position
the time when bees are least inclined to sting. A bee stings only necessary to insert her stinger, at least if the cluster hasn't been there
when her body is handled roughly or when she "thinks" she needs for more than three or four days. Bees in a cluster can often be gen-
to protect her home. Bees in a swarm are just travelers; they are tly picked up by the handful like so many berries. It is during this
temporarily without a home to protect, and if a bee in a swarm is time that a beekeeper, if he discovers the cluster, can gather up all
not physically threatened, it is improbable that she will sting. I have those workers and the queen and transfer them to an empty hive,
stood in the middle of a swarm in flight and had bees bump into thus obtaining for himself the start of a new working colony.
me, bounce off, and continue as though nothing had happened. (There is no point in trying to return them to the hive that they

42 San Antonio Medicine • November 2018