STUDY ABOUT SWARMING OF HONEYBEE Introduction A colony of honeybees will consist of tens thousands of individuals, in the wild they

may live in a hollow tree or a crack or crevice in some rocks, although these days they are found in the cavity wall of a house, or in one of the many types of honeybee hives which are used around the world. Wherever they are, there is likely to be limited space for the bees, their brood and honey stores, when they run out of space they will cast a swarm, and the process is called swarming. It is the natural process used for colony reproduction. In swarming, the old queen flies away from the hive with thousands of worker bees and a few male drones to form a new colony, they can number from 2,000 to in excess of 40,000, although from 10,000 to 15,000 is much more common. In the first swarming, the colony is the largest and will usually include the original mother queen with 5070% of the workers and a few drones. There may be further swarming with a virgin queen, these swarms are much smaller, typically only around 2,000 honeybees in total. Once they have found a permanent home she must fly off to mate and return to the colony before she can start to lay, these colonies are particularly vulnerable due to their low numbers. The swarm will have worker bees of all ages, these live for around 6 weeks in midsummer, so as soon as the swarm settles the workers will begin to die off. The queen can be gone for 2-3 days on a mating flight, then may not lay eggs immediately upon her return, although even if she does begin to lay straight away it takes 21 days for a laid egg to hatch into a larvae, then be sealed in and emerge as an adult worker honeybee, so the swarm can be almost on the verge of collapse when these first workers emerge. The colony must then grow incredibly fast and find huge amounts of stores if it has any chance of surviving the winter, unfortunately they rarely do without help and feed from beekeepers, particularly with the very cold winters. Many beekeepers will go out, collect and take it away to a safe place, help it to get established in a new hive by feeding and treating it for disease, this gives it as good a chance as possible to make it through the winter. Sometimes, particularly if the later swarms were quite late in the year it will still not be possible for us to make them strong enough to have enough bees in the cluster to last over winter, in this case we will unite colonies to make one larger one, this is common practice as one large colony has a better chance of surviving the winter than 2 or more smaller ones. Either way, they come out of the winter fit and healthy, ready to pollinate our crops and gardens and of course, make some honey.

Symptoms of Swarming The number of drone cells and drones in the colony increases Queen cells are seen at the edges of combs Bees cluster at the hive entrance Bees hover around the hive making a piping sound There are many bees flying a short distance from the existing hive and clustering on a nearby tree branch or similar place. Causes Genetic trait Congestion in the colony Lack of space for egg laying Lack of space for hive food storage Increase in temperature Delay in requeening Season and Time Swarming takes place when there is a sufficient flow of pollen and nectar. The most favourable time is spring and autumn at lower altitudes, and, May, June, and July in the high hills. Swarming usually takes place on a sunny day from around 9 to 10 in the morning to 3 in the afternoon. In hot areas swarming may start earlier at around from 7 or 8 am. Swarming does not occur when it is rainy or stormy. Control and Management A strong colony can be weakened by swarming, which reduces honey yield. Management practices should aim to control swarming using the following approaches. Prevention Inspect the colony at regular intervals. Allow sufficient space in the brood and super for brood rearing and honey storage. Add new comb foundation so that the bees can make more comb cells for eggs and collection of nectar and pollen. Destroy unnecessary queen cells. Remove any combs with unnecessary drone cells. Enable good ventilation with full air circulation in the hive. Requeen the colony with a quality queen each year. Place a queen gate at the hive entrance if there are signals indicating the start of swarming. Divide the colony. Swarm capture If a colony does swarm, it should be captured and rehoused as follows. Try to settle the flying bees by spraying dust and water.

Allow the bees to cluster for a while at one place. Capture the swarm with the help of a swarm bag or basket. Hang the bag with the swarm near the desired area for the new hive. Put the swarm in a new beehive. Transfer combs with nectar, pollen, and brood from the existing hive to the new hive. Provide supplementary feeding if there is a food deficit. Use a queen gate for 3 days to keep the queen in the new hive.

Figure

Figure : Honeybee swarming

a) capturing a swarm with a swarm bag

b) capturing a swarm with a basket

c) hanging the swarm bag with the captured swarm d) hiving the swarm into a new hive

e) new hive with queen gate fitted Figure: Capturing and hiving a swarm