Swarm

On Friday we lost 1/2 a hive at the farm. Sad day. That said, watching the swarm was one of the coolest things I've done in a long time. I was at the wash station when I heard a strange humming sound & thought maybe one of the volunteers had left their car running. Upon investigation, I discovered it was coming from the crazy swarm of bees leaving one of the hives. It looked like this when I stood in the middle of it:

(The blurry dots around the little walnut tree aren't pixels..they're swarming honeybees!)
 
Here's a bunch of them sitting on the tree leaves:

And here's what I saw forming when I looked up:

Called Sarah Hemingway to see about catching the swarm (since beekeeper Trina was on vacation) & she brought out an empty super to try to entice them, but sadly they had other ideas & got away while we were in the field weeding.

The other 1/2 of the colony will have remained in their hive with the original queen. They were likely overcrowded & decided to let a new queen hatch - a new queen which 1/2 the bees will have taken to a new home in the wild. As I understand it, this is sad for honey production on a number of levels:
1. 1/2 the population of the hive has been lost, depleting productive potential for the rest of the season.
2. The 1/2 that left will have gorged themselves on honey in preparation for their departure, depleting existing supplies as well.

Wish I could've caught them leaving & followed them to their new home - though I'm not sure anything could have beeen done to recapture them once they'd settled. Sad day for honey at Fertile Ground, but it was a pretty spectacular thing to witness.