Honey bee swarm, what to do?

Honey bees swarming? Don’t panic!!!

Honeybees are very social creatures within their colony. After a long winter bees start back with their regular routines when the warm weather of spring comes around. This means not only are they out collecting nectar and pollen for honey production but they are also creating new bees (brood).

The Brood

The brood consists of eggs, larvae and bee pupae which will house workers and drones. The female worker bees make up the majority of the brood (smaller cells) with male drones having a bit larger cell but very few are laid and their only job is for reproduction.

If the colony is making a new queen bee, or preparing to swarm, you may find queen cells. These new queen cells are larger than the rest due to the queen being the biggest bee in the colony.

Swarming 

Usually in spring and early summer, the colony will decide to swarm due to space and/or reproductive reasons.

We are not going to get into all the details of queen rearing but we’ll cover the very basics.

Either the old queen will leave to let a new queen take over or the colony will kick out the new queens and some bees will follow. This is when you see swarms of bees and this is the time you call us so that we can give them a new safe home. If left to the wild many of these swarms will die, hence the reason to call a beekeeper like us to come and collect them. We check them for any parasites or other diseases to make sure they are healthy and then we give them a new home to live out their days.

If you see a swarm, don’t panic they will not sting you – stay calm, call us right away due to bees sometimes do not hang around long and they will follow their queen.

If you are located in the Greater Niagara Region give us a call at: 905.984.4408

These are the locations we service and everything in between:
Niagara Falls, Port Colborne, St. Catharines, Thorold, Welland, Fort Erie, Grimsby, Lincoln, Niagara-on-the-Lake, Pelham, Wainfleet, West Lincoln and Hamilton