Bee Swarms - Important

[chris pp]

Bee swarms can start to arrive any time from about mid April depending on region and climate.

Only honey bees make a swarm that forms into a cluster. 

The size of the cluster can vary and be up to 20,000 bees and possibly more. 

They will usually settle in a tree or bush for some days during which time a number of bees designated with the task of finding a suitable home will be looking for one. 

It's important to call a bee-keeper as soon as possible if you see one of these swarms to enable it to be collected before it ends up in somebodies roof or chimney. 

List of English speaking bee keepers that will collect swarms. 

http://www.planetepassion.eu/WILDLIFE-IN-FRANCE/Collection-of-bee-swarms-in-France-English-speaking.html 

List of French speaking bee keepers that will collect swarms can be found on the same link. 

This is a photo of a bee swarm.

 [IMG]http://i133.photobucket.com/albums/q73/unautremonde/Oddments/The-swarm1.jpg[/IMG]

Cheers, Chris

[Polly]

Good reminder Chris.

Folk heading for their second homes should be v careful when opening up if they don't have a caretaker or neighbour checking the house: bee swarms and wasps nests are very common between windows and exterior shutters. If you go into a dark room to fling the windows open always turn a light on or take a torch, then if you see a swarm or a nest leave the window closed and call for help.

Listen for buzzing up your chimneys, and in lofts too.

[Framboise]

We have already found the beginnings of a wasp nest in the roof so they were despatched asap.

Friends are doing a renovation of an old building on their property and to their horror the roofer discovered an absolutely huge colony of what he said were honeybees inside the wall. The apiarist came to take them away next day, but alas he took one look and said "Non!" because they are not honeybees so he doesn't want them obviously. It looks like this old thriving colony will be destroyed instead which is a shame.

[Catalpa]

They probably are honeybees but the likely reason he didn't want them is that to successfully remove a colony one needs to retrieve the queen. To do that from an enclosed space usually means a lot of destruction to get into the space. So it may simply and unfortunately be impractical - for that particular beek, anyway.

[ViVienne]

we came across one of these while out walking.....they chased us down the lane and we both got stung a couple of times. Unfortunatly we had to walk back past them on our way back, so we all tiptoed very quietly...dogs included, must have looked funny but it worked they didn't notice us on the way back!

[Frenchie]

THANKS A LOT for this posting, I got a huge one in one of my trees, my son has noticed it this pm  and asked me to come and have a look.

I said to him that we should probably call a bee keeper, but I was not sure 100% .

That will be done tomorrow morning .

Merci encore !

[Stan Streason]

Thanks for the origional post for this together with the link to beekeepers.

My son got to our house yesterday (been empty 3 weeks) and there is a big swarm between a bedroom window and the shutter.

From the link found someone 15km away, sent an email last night and they will be round this evening.

Not quite sure how I would have sorted it otherwise.

Thanks again

[Grumpy]

Sound advice from Chris.  Only two points I'd make.  Firstly thre swarm will be on the lookout for any suitable permanent home which may be many places other than chimneys such as old hollow trees and gaps in brickwork where they are sheltered from the elephants (oops, that should be elements) and Secondly PLEASE DO NOT DESTROY THEM UNLESS IT IS ABSOLUTELY VITAL!!!! Honey bees are becoming scarcer and they are a vital source of polination.

(Think about becoming an Apiarist yourself, it's very rewarding.)

Grumpy

[Stan Streason]

[quote user="Stan Streason"]

Thanks for the origional post for this together with the link to beekeepers.

My son got to our house yesterday (been empty 3 weeks) and there is a big swarm between a bedroom window and the shutter.

From the link found someone 15km away, sent an email last night and they will be round this evening.

Not quite sure how I would have sorted it otherwise.

Thanks again

[/quote]

Update - bees enticed into a hive overnight and taken away the next morning.  All very easy (for me at least).  About 5,000 in the swarm.

[Swissie]

On Planet TV channel this Monday at 23.40 - a documentary on disappearing bees. Set the videos on - it should be very interesting.