Evelyn Prescher, age 11, of Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, for her question:
What causes a swarm of bees?
The hive of the honeybee has enchanted nature lovers throughout the ages. It is a self contained realm, a miniature kingdom run by rules of its own. It even has built in procedures to cope with emergencies. A swarm of bees is responding to a problem of over crowding.
Scientists of the past described the activities of the honeybee and answered many questions about what goes on in the amazing hive. Modern scientists tackled the tantalizing questions of why and how the hive carries on its superb organization. These deep secrets are being solved one by one, but many mysteries still remain. Only recently, new light was shed on what causes thousands of bees to leave the hive in swarm. We learned long ago that the swarm goes off to start a new hive. This explains what the swarm does and perhaps suggests why. Our new information explains a factor that may trigger the operation. I t seems to explain what causes the bees to solve a hive emergency by swarming.
The emergency is a need to expand and it appears to be related directly to the queen bee of the hive. This royal lady lays all the eggs and she is the mother of all the workers and drones in her kingdom. Handmaidens feed her and tenderly groom her and a guard of honor always clusters around her. She is the biggest bee and the only egg layer and she also has special glands in her jaws. These tiny glands secrete a unique chemical and the queen mother uses her mouth to spread it all over her body. Minuscule particles are picked up by the handmaiden bees that groom the queen and spread through the hive from one bee mouth to the nest.
And this royal salve carries chemical messages. It blocks the natural impulses feeble with age, her salve weakens and when she dies the supply stops. Then the workers are freed to replace her with a vigorous new queen. rn the flowery summer season, the queen's coded chemical is spread very thin among the thousands of extra bees born to share the work load. This situation triggers its own solution. The colony prepares to divide.
Nursemaids place eggs into some extra large cells and give the infants special food that will make them become queens. Other workers scout the neighborhood for a suitable site to build a new home. Then the reigning queen leaves the hive, along with about half of the colony. She settles on a bough or a post and her faithful followers swarm around her, clinging by their feet in a big, brown living ball of bees. This is a gathering place. Later the queen and her teeming swarm will move on to take up residence in the site already selected. Back in the old hive, the bees keep busy until their new queen is ready to take over her duties.
A swarm of bees is a newsy event and human spectators gather to observe the teem¬ing activity. A qualified beekeeper may arrive. He has the know how to change the determined swarming plans to suit himself. He captures the swarm, bag and baggage, and coaxes it into a man made hive structure. Later he may rent his treasure trove to farmers who need bees to fertilize their crops and orchards. The new hive will produce combs of mouth watering honey and the beekeeper will take his fair share of this delicious bee product.