A Bee Story-Swarmy

[DayValleyDahlias]

Got a call from my cousin tonight just as I got home from work...he lives in Monterey which is about 38 miles from here..He said, he found a pile of dead bees in his driveway, under the arch of an oak tree.  He said they were dropping out of the tree and he could hear them plop to the ground :'(.

He said that he went to sweep them up, but bees came at him from elsewhere...so he went indside.

I asked him to go outside and look in the tree, and sure enough, there is a swarm up there in the oak...He is supposed to send me pics tonight...

I can only speculate as to why the bees are/ have died...I told him that the swarm may move on...or not...I would offer to try and collect the swarm..but if bees are dying, I think not...

Any ideas?  I was thinking...maybe bees got into Buckeye, or got into poison , or weer sick to begin with???

What do you all think???

[JP]

Its possible that someone sprayed them with pesticide before they swarmed to this location.

[Brian D. Bray]

I would say that what you'll find is comb on the branches underneath those bees.  An open air hive occurs occasionally.  Especially is it is someplace the bees feel safe.  If the branches are fairly dense the swarm could have been there for weeks before your cousin noticed.  Now that the older bees from the swarm are starting to die off and falling out of the nest they were noticed.  

Catching this swarm may have to be done more like a cutout than a swarm capture.

[DayValleyDahlias]

According to my cousin...ALL of the bees died...so sad

[JP]

Seems like they were sprayed. So sad.

[Cindi]

Sharon, that is terrible.  The bees must have been attacked by the human spraying toxins upon their very souls.  Awful thing that happens to the creatures of our world.  Have a wonderful day, great life.  Cindi