Turnpike Fields Bees

Turnpike Swarm

Chris Knibbs

Beeman to the rescue

Rescue Hive

Turnpike Bees

On Monday I received a phone call from our local bee expert, Chris Knibbs. He told me that he had just been contacted by Susan Cavill -- a regular Audlem perambulator and dog exerciser -- with the message:-
"Chris, a swarm of bees are accumulating in a Turnpike Field tree".
He asked me if could he have access to the field so as to rescue the swarm!

Chris picks up the the story:-

"After a quick phone call with Susan at 12:30 regarding the exact whereabouts of the swarm, myself and the 'Bee Wagon' were on Turnpike field by 1pm. The swarm was caught and successfully rehoused by 1:50pm!!

You have to be quick with a swarm. Once the bees decide where their new home is going to be, they are off -- anything up to 7 miles away but usually less, and they may end up in someone's chimney stack or hole in a wall.
Bees are loyal to their queen and huddle close to feed her and keep her warm. She needs 35-37 Deg. C to stay well. The worker bees will have gorged themselves with honey before swarming, not knowing where their next food is coming from, but they also use this honey to convert into beeswax to make honeycomb for the queen to lay her eggs in.

Having arrived on the field -- it was like a Prairie -- peering through the truck windscreen over the swaying grassland. Soon, the now coalesced swarm was spotted hanging from an oak tree branch like a rugby ball, but fortunately not too far out of reach.
On this occasion there was no need for any heroics with multiple ladders and ropes. I simply climbed onto the back of the Bee Wagon, snipped off a few leaves around the swarm, lifted a new hive underneath and shook the bees from the branch directly into the hive, closed the lid and rested it on the Bee Wagon with a wooden ramp at the entrance. During the next half hour, all the remaining flying bees had sensed the queen was in the hive and flew in or crawled up the ramp to join her. The entrance was then closed, a sturdy ratchet strap attached over the hive to secure it and a short drive to their new home in a nearby Audlem apiary -- a few more local bees to pollinate our meadows, gardens, and crops.

Steve Elliott

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