Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
What goes on in a swarm?
If no one collects it and a swarm is left alone to hang up, scout bees will constantly go
to and fro from suitable sites. They will convey their message about a suitable site to the
swarm by dancing on its surface and by recruiting new scouts to view their proposal. It
seems a swarm will take up home in the proposed site of those scouts who are able to
recruit the most dancers and who dance the most vigorously in favour of their home
site.
Once they have decided, the scouts will initiate a mass takeoff, possibly by using a
vibrating form of body language and by making a piping sound. The swarm will then
head off to its new home, directed all the way by scouts who fly through the swarm in the
required direction. If you have seen a swarm moving through the air, it seems to be an
aimless mass of insects whirling around in all directions and not really going anywhere.
But it is, and you soon realize that it is moving fairly quickly if you try to follow it. It's
like an optical illusion: it is easy to follow on foot until it flies over a hedge or a river or
other obstacle, and then you can loose it. The scouts dive down to the entrance of the
new home and, slowly but surely, the swarm follows and takes up residence.
Taking up residence
Within minutes of taking up residence, the workers build comb, without which the
colony cannot function. One of the possible reasons why bees in a swarm are gentle is
that, during this process, they are conditioned not to sting. Before leaving their previous
home, each of them fills up with honey. Most of this is used to synthesize wax to build
the new home, and all the bees are needed for this: no honey, no wax; no wax, no new
home. If they go around stinging, they will die and their honey will be wasted.
My point earlier about swarms pulling out wax comb is a serious one. That is their first
main aim, and the beekeeper can use this propensity. You always need comb.
Other workers will be out foraging and, within half an hour, the swarm will be a
colony. Where previously there was one colony, there are now two - reproduction and
dissemination, just like us.
