Late last week, there was a swarm of bees hanging from a tree outside the building in downtown Des Moines where I work. Someone had noticed it in the evening and posted about it on Facebook - word got back to Animal Control and they were out there the next morning to take care of it. I didn't see it, but the general process is that they sweep the bees into a big box, making sure the queen is among them, and take them away somewhere where they can be relocated in a new hive stack, which they'll readily adopt. While they're hanging off the tree in a swarm, they are generally quite docile, as there is no home or brood to protect.
Of course, not ALL the bees go into the box, because a bunch are flying around ... so now, a week later, there is still a couple hundred homeless bees hanging around on that branch, likely living out their remaining days, which is, per the title, kind of a bummer.
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| These worker bees were part of a swarm. Their queen, and most of the bees from their former hive, had been corralled and relocated to a more suitable location. |
Lacking a queen or hive, these bees have no mission or focus, and no way to start a new hive. A hard future for an orderly honey bee.
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Incidentally, several weeks later, there is still a lump of bees on that spot on the tree - they don't know anything else to do - I'd love to gather them up some night and add them to one of my hives (there's a fairly easy method for doing that), but it's a lot of bother for a hundred or so bees ...
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