Charles Schulz once wrote, “A person doesn’t really own a Dog.  You just make him feel obligated to stick around.”  The same holds true for Honey Bees.  With the arrival of spring comes their innate desire to spread their wings, say goodbye to the old hive, and form a new colony.  This is known as swarming, when the Queen Bee leaves the hive with a large group of Worker Bees, to establish a new colony.  Meanwhile, the remaining Honey Bees in the old hive get to work establishing a new Queen and carry on with business as usual.  But I want to keep all my Bees in my apiary!  So it is my job in the spring to make the Honey Bees feel obligated to stick around and not swarm.

Let’s face it, after being cooped up all winter in their hive, things can start to get a bit crowded.  There can be thousands of Bees living in a single hive, which makes it difficult for all the Worker Bees to have access to their Queen and do their intended jobs.  This also makes it difficult for the Queen Bee to reign over her kingdom.  Therefore, she starts preparing her loyal subjects to make the monumental move.  The process begins with the creation of queen cells so that they don’t leave their old hive without a leader.  Once these are established, the Worker Bees will slowly start reducing how much they feed their Queen Bee.  This is for two reasons: to reduce the number of eggs she lays, and to help her to shed some weight in preparation for the long flight ahead.  In addition to caring for the Queen and creating a new one, the Worker Bees are also busy sealing off the cells and filling up on nectar in preparation to leave on the first nice spring day.

Meanwhile, Scout Bees go out in search of a new home for their colony.  Scout Bees are seasoned foragers, with a huge responsibility.  It is up to them to find the perfect place to establish a new home.  After all, with the exception of the crowded conditions, their colony is leaving a perfectly good hive.  Therefore, when choosing a new home they need to take into consideration will there be plenty of food, is the location safe from the intrusion of other bugs and worst yet predators, and will this new location provide adequate protection from the weather including rain, wind and snow.  The survival of their fellow Honey Bees depends on it!  Now that’s a stressful job!  Undaunted though, they head out, and don’t return until they find a suitable site.  Once they are successful, they return to the others and report their findings with what best can be described as a happy dance!  They circle.  They sway.  They zip and they zag, as a means to explain to the others where they will be headed.  Beekeepers call this their “waggle dance,” and as a Dog who loves to wag his tail when excited I can totally understand the name!

With a hearty farewell to the Honey Bees remaining behind, the Queen Bee leaves the hive with a large group of her Worker Bees.  Sometimes as many as 60% of the hive!  Swarming Bees are quite a sight to behold, and I’ve been told that the sound they create is really quite intimidating.  Have no fear though!  Honey Bees tend to be really quite docile, even when swarming.  They only sting to protect themselves, or when their hive is threatened.  Without a hive filled with young Bees and food to protect, Honey Bees really are quite passive.  However despite all these efforts to leave, initially they don’t fly very far.  Let’s face it, the Queen Bee doesn’t go out much and she isn’t the best at flying.  So after their initial take-off they may gather at a nearby tree, a shed, or any suitable surface only a few feet from their old hive.  This is by no means their final destination.  After getting over the initial excitement of the swarm, within a few hours they leave to travel to their new home.

Now for anyone who has ever moved into a new home, you know that this is a lot of work!  Therefore as a beekeeper, it is my job to relieve the stress of overcrowding, and make my Honey Bees feel obligated to stick around, so they won’t want to swarm.  One way to reduce overcrowding is to divide the hive in two.  This is a complicated process, so I’ll spare you the details today.  Another option is to trick the Bees into thinking they have more space.  This can be done by rearranging the frames within a hive.  By removing a few full frames and adding empty ones, the Worker Bees get to work preparing them to be used.  They’re called Worker Bees for a reason.  When they see work to be done, they do it!  Adding a super with more frames for them to put their nectar will also give them more space to work.  This way they won’t feel obligated to use their brood combs for nectar storage.

However just to be on the safe side, if our tricks don’t work and the Bees do leave, Dad and I spent the winter building swarm boxes, also known as Nuc boxes.  A Nuc box is basically a mini-hive with empty frames that can be transferred to a full-size hive.  A swarm of Honey Bees may choose it as a good place to establish a new hive, and start building their combs, without realizing the beekeeper’s plans are to simply transfer the frames to a new hive near their old one!  Dad and I hung our two swarm boxes on what seems to us like a logical flight path for a Honey Bees when foraging for food.  Paws crossed our plan works, and my Bees feel obligated to stick around in Azzza Hive!