Meridith Ford Goldman contacted me today about a swarm of bees from her hive at her parents house. When I arrived Meridith told me that her mom said they had started the behavior of landing in the wisteria tree and then making a clump on the ground about 25' away on Tuesday.
The couple of pounds of bees on the ground were a first swarm and the smaller swarm on the tree looked to be a secondary swarm. But why was there bees on the ground and why would the swarm in the tree start to join the bees on the ground during the day?
After doing some reading on this while eating lunch, I learned that sometimes the queen is too fat with eggs to fly far. So even though the workers wanted to land on a tree, her highness just was not able to do it. I know that this was the first swarm since she's a mated queen. I did get her I believe and hopefully the rest of them will march into the 10 frame deep with drawn comb we put out for them.
The bees in the wisteria seemed to be less organize and had a bit of a temperament. The virgin queen was doing a really good job of hiding in the vines of the wisteria and even after cutting and brushing I know that I didn't get her.
So I believe that swarm in the wisteria was drawn to the mated queen on the ground, but had a virgin queen in the tree and just didn't really know what to do. Hopefully the bees in the wisteria will join the other swarm.
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We got a small swarm like that last year. Part in the tree, the rest on the ground. I think we got the Queen but wasn't smart enough to look for her in the grass. It was a very small swarm and wax moths over ran them before they had a chance to build up.
I learned so much, Cassandra! You are a marvel with bees, and I can't thank you enough for coming so quickly to our rescue. I'll be moving the new hive this evening!
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