Was this a swarm?

[jeremy_c]

If you have followed my thread any of "Two installs merged into one hive!?" then you know that I installed two packages yesterday and one package (Italian bees w/a Russian queen) had a large percentage of bees leave the hive and join with the other package (Italians with Italian queen) that was installed about 4 hours earlier. Today I witnessed what I think was the Russian hive swarming and finally setting down in the Italian hive. The only thing that is confusing is that there were thousands of bees in the air and I didn't think the Russian hive had any where near that count of bees.

The compressed video does not do this justice at all, but you may be able to get an idea what was going on by what you see and how I describe it. I am hoping to identify what happened. Thanks for looking at this and helping me identify this.

The video is located at: http://jeremy.lifewithchrist.org/permalink/48268.html

Thanks again, Jeremy.

[jdpro5010]

I would quess that it was more of an abscond than a swarm.  In my experience you would definitely see a black cloud of bees if it was a swarm.

[Kathyp]

the italian hive may have started to swarm and changed it's mind. 

[jeremy_c]

I would quess that it was more of an abscond than a swarm.  In my experience you would definitely see a black cloud of bees if it was a swarm.

A black cloud of bees because they are so close or because of the sheer numbers? This hive that did this (I think, I'm still trying to sort it all out) had only a fist full of bees left in it.

Jeremy

[jeremy_c]

the italian hive may have started to swarm and changed it's mind. 

The thing that is confusing is the Russian hive is now empty. So, they certainly went somewhere. I am only guessing that the mass amount of activity in front of the Italian hive means they went there, I don't know.

When I decided to start beekeeping, I knew I would be learning a lot of things, I guess I should be happy for this experience :-) Looking in #7 (the Italian hive from the 3# package yesterday) you can see tons of bees. I don't think they would have all fit inside one of the 3# package boxes that they came in. I may be wrong, but it's the largest collection of bees I've ever seen (which has not been many :-D). All my other hives were started from packages as well, some 2# and others 3#. I have not had a 4# package before, but have seen one and what's in the Italian hive is larger than that easy.

Jeremy

[jdpro5010]

It is more of a concentration of bees whether it is close or far away.  Kind of like a fast moving dark cloud.