Swarming and memory

[Monsieur Abeille]

A question for you clever chaps and ladies ......

Presumably, if a swarm takes up camp a few hundred years from its mother hive, the bees know to relearn their position. So.... does that mean that once a swarm occurs, all of its occupants forget their old internal maps, and if that is true, is it OK to move a captured swarm back to near where it came from immediately? I've always moved them a few miles away initially before bringing them back after some weeks.

 

[madasafish]

A question for you clever chaps and ladies ......

Presumably, if a swarm takes up camp a few hundred years from its mother hive, the bees know to relearn their position. So.... does that mean that once a swarm occurs, all of its occupants forget their old internal maps, and if that is true, is it OK to move a captured swarm back to near where it came from immediately? I've always moved them a few miles away initially before bringing them back after some weeks.

They do appear to lose their internal maps.
I have had frequent swarms on branches 10 meters away from their hive and rehived them 5 to 15 meters away.. with no issues.

 

[beeno]

A question for you clever chaps and ladies ......

Presumably, if a swarm takes up camp a few hundred years from its mother hive, the bees know to relearn their position. So.... does that mean that once a swarm occurs, all of its occupants forget their old internal maps, and if that is true, is it OK to move a captured swarm back to near where it came from immediately? I've always moved them a few miles away initially before bringing them back after some weeks.

Yes, as long as you have the swarm queen. I was too quick on one occasion and in the morning the nuc with QX on was empty. They had gone back to the original hive. They swarmed again later and I cleaned the parent hive out of all the QCs and put the swarm back in there. Where they still live happily.

 

[Monsieur Abeille]

Yes, as long as you have the swarm queen. I was too quick on one occasion and in the morning the nuc with QX on was empty. They had gone back to the original hive. They swarmed again later and I cleaned the parent hive out of all the QCs and put the swarm back in there. Where they still live happily.

which leads to my next question ... I've always shied away from reintroducing the swarm immediately back to its parent hive with its stay at home occupants. Have I been daft all this time, and does a clear out of QCs and virgin queens render it acceptable to all?

 

[enrico]

which leads to my next question ... I've always shied away from reintroducing the swarm immediately back to its parent hive with its stay at home occupants. Have I been daft all this time, and does a clear out of QCs and virgin queens render it acceptable to all?

Miss just one and they will be off again. They also seem, in my experience, to try and swarm again if the season allows!
E

 

[jfullerton]

Miss just one and they will be off again. They also seem, in my experience, to try and swarm again if the season allows!
E

 

[REDWOOD]

Swarms are a funny old thing, I read up about swarm pheromones once and they act like a new colony, sat nav reset

 

[Erichalfbee]

Swarms from my apiary get moved to the most convenient empty spot. Sometimes next to where they came from. Never any problem.

 

[dpearce4]

Swarms are a funny old thing, I read up about swarm pheromones once and they act like a new colony, sat nav reset

Ten years ago you would have said bought a new AA road map as satnavs were so expensive they were seen as an expensive optional extra.

In five years time im sure you will say google has updated their map app.

 

[Brian Bush]

The majority of bees in a swarm are young nurse bees and will only have been outside for cleansing flights.
Memories do appear to be a little sketchy after swarming and often bees can be boxed up right next to their home hives.
I know of one experienced beekeeper who short of boxes place a QE under the old brood box and just poured the swarm back in. He said the bees would sort themselves out in a couple of days and that way did not deplete the colony.
It worked for him but I would not recommend it except in an emergency.
I never did find out whether they tore down the QCs or killed the old queen.

 

[Plenty of honey]

Ive done the same when i started and quickly found that as soon as bees go in to swarm mode and they have initially clustered, it seems it dosent matter where you put them, far or close to the mother hive it came from. The reason why they abscond after or not is another matter, if you dont touch them, other than rehouse them in a suitable hive, Nuc or whatever you keep your bees in.

Although i have never tried this, Apparently if you remove all the queens, i.e. the main queen it left the hive with (prime swarm or cast ) and any virgins contained in the swarm, bees will find their way back to the original hive.
They leave in a steady procession. Theres a video on it on you tube i think! It proves they still know their way, but they get like a "swarming fever override"!!
Also to add, i have move lots of swarms and think that if you do move them more than the 3 mile rule away, they seem to abscond less. (purely my point of view)
Dont know if anyone else has any comparisons with this issue. Very interesting topic!

 

[mbc]

Tom Seeley's work shines a lot of light on these sort of questions.
Often, swarms which depart again soon after 're hiving do so because they do still have a map of the locality and their scouts had already determined on a new site within range of where they've been plonked.

 

[Bee Bumble]

I had a swarm leave on a cold March morning to land in a nearby fruit tree about 3 metres away. I put them in a hive back to back to their old hive, facing the other direction. The young bees and queen settled on the combs provided but the old bees collected on the inside of the front wall, all pointing heads up. The next morning, they all departed.

Another year, a swarm landed in a large tree in my garden. I caught them (including the queen) and put them in a hive left under the tree to allow the last few bees to enter. Within half an hour they had all gone back to their tree but much higher up, out of my reach. They left 24hrs later.

 

[BeeJayBee]

which leads to my next question ... I've always shied away from reintroducing the swarm immediately back to its parent hive with its stay at home occupants. Have I been daft all this time, and does a clear out of QCs and virgin queens render it acceptable to all?

Probably better to put the swarm in a box and let the old colony raise a new queen. Allow enough time to assess her and, if she's good enough, despatch the old queen and combine the two colonies.

Or, once the new colony is okay and the swarm has built up, put part of the swarm plus old queen in a nuc and combine the rest of the bees with the new colony. That gives you a spare colony and probably enough bees for honey.

 

[user 6228]

See paper

Does swarming cause honey bees to update their solar ephemerides?
William F. Towne, Christopher M. Baer, Sarah J. Fabiny, Lisa M. Shinn
Journal of Experimental Biology 2005 208: 4049-4061; doi: 10.1242/jeb.01869

 

[pargyle]

Probably better to put the swarm in a box and let the old colony raise a new queen. Allow enough time to assess her and, if she's good enough, despatch the old queen and combine the two colonies.

Or, once the new colony is okay and the swarm has built up, put part of the swarm plus old queen in a nuc and combine the rest of the bees with the new colony. That gives you a spare colony and probably enough bees for honey.

Best options if they have swarmed. Ideally keep an eye on things and sort it out BEFORE they swarm.

Having said that .. my strongest colony was a swarm from one of my hives and one of my long time beekeeping friends (his hives are in his orchard so he has no worries about swarming bees) allows his bees to swarm and he reckons that bees are like strawberries .. first year they get established, second year big crop, third year - ready for replacement.

Certainly, swarming is a very natural part of bees behaviour and you see a great deal of vigour in terms of comb building and foraging post swarming ... perhaps the bees do know best ?

Not that easy though if you live in the town or in the middle of an estate !!

 

[Monsieur Abeille]

Thanks all, a lot of really interesting posts there and I will feel more relaxed about rehousing a swarm back near their roots.

The majority of bees in a swarm are young nurse bees and will only have been outside for cleansing flights.

e.g. I never knew that, in fact if asked I would have guessed the other way

... The young bees and queen settled on the combs provided but the old bees collected on the inside of the front wall, all pointing heads up....

At the risk of driving my own thread , is it easy to identify old/young bees? Is it a question of size or how they behave?

 

[Monsieur Abeille]

See paper

Does swarming cause honey bees to update their solar ephemerides?
William F. Towne, Christopher M. Baer, Sarah J. Fabiny, Lisa M. Shinn
Journal of Experimental Biology 2005 208: 4049-4061; doi: 10.1242/jeb.01869

That looks really interesting thanks, and dismisses even more of my sketchy understanding of bee behaviour! If I catch the drift of the intro right, bees do not re-learn the sun's movements at a new site, whether post swarm or not, but they rely on the local landscape. The sun movement learnt at their original site is the only one they retain. Will have to read the lot when my brain is feeling more receptive!

For any interested, this is the link

http://jeb.biologists.org/content/jexbio/208/21/4049.full.pdf

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

The majority of bees in a swarm are young nurse bees and will only have been outside for cleansing flights.

I think Seeley and others have disproven that - a swarm is made up of a balanced mix of young and old bees - no different to the 'mother' colony

 

[Erichalfbee]

At the risk of driving my own thread , is it easy to identify old/young bees? Is it a question of size or how they behave?

Young bees are hairy