Bee Swarm

While tending the garden a few days ago, we noticed a tremendous noise like a waterfall, it turned out to be our bees swarming.  We were profoundly moved to witness this spiritual event.  

 

Bee Swarms are the Bee Colony or Bee Community's natural way of reproducing itself to form two communities.  Bee Swarms are feared by conventional beekeepers because 50-75% of the worker bees in the hive leave with the Queen Bee, therefore the productivity of the hive is reduced by the swarming.  Many bee keepers are able to catch the swarm in a new hive.  Before the Swarm leaves the hive all the preparations are made so that the old hive will soon hatch out a new Queen and continue to flourish.   The hive is full of brood (baby bees) and honey and everything is ready for the new queen to take her position!  Meanwhile the old queen with the worker, swarms, first they gather on a branch of a tree and scout bees are sent out to find a new home.  The scout bees return and by a special dance they tell the other bees the direction of the new home and depending on how excited they are they convey how good the new home is.  If the scout can convince the other scouts that she has found a good location, more of the scouts go with her to check it out, and eventually they reach a decision in a process that can take from a few hours to a few days.  

Here you can see the bees swarming, creating a noise which can be heard easily from 100 feet away.  

The natural honey bee population here has been in decline and the colony collapse disorder has been rampantly affecting mostly conventional large bee operations.  We house our bees for several purposes:  For the Spiritual Significance of Bees, and for the Misterio who likes to have bees around;  So that the fruit trees and garden can be pollenated by the bees and be very productive; For Honey; For Wax; and to make a contribution, a gesture, towards strengthening a needed balance and energy brought to the Earth and all our Relatives through the Honey Bee.  Since profit is not our motive, we did not view the swarming bees as a negative occurrence.  We were thrilled, honored and delighted to see the bees swarming as through the swarm our bees were truly making a contribution to the natural honey bee populations as they would find themselves a new home, perhaps in a old tree, in a place that they felt comfortable, as the fact is that honey bees prefer to live much higher off the ground than the conventional hive or top bar hive allows them.  

The swarming bees can be seen leaving the hive which had become too cramped for all of them.

The swarm forms on a nearby tree, although swarming bees are rarely aggressive because they are not defending a hive, we tentatively approached them, camera in hand.

There is at least 10,000 bees in this swarm.  Notice it has formed in the shape of a heart!  The vibration of the sound of these bees was truly awe inspiring and has a way of entering one's Spirit and Essence.  We affirmed that our bees would find a really good new home and continue to flourish.  We were awed by their courage in leaving a fully stocked hive to all the young bees (nurse bees who take care of the larvae), and a smaller contingent of worker bees (gather nectar) and a young (virgin) queen.  All that the bees who swarmed had with them was the nectar in their stomachs, their intelligence, and much courage!  The bees exhibited a profound selflessness, and it was a profound honor to witness this event.  We thanked the Mysteries that allowed us to be in the right place at the right time to witness this, because we might easily have totally missed it, as by the next morning, the swarm had left to their new home.  

As Paleros and Taino, this was a profound spiritual event for us.  Since we work with all the elements, and work with the Misterios behind these elements this was a blessing.  We were very excited be witnesses to this and to see the power and Mystery behind this Event.  This is not something that we see everyday, or even every year.  I am grateful to my goddaughter who told me to get a hobby and grateful that I carry my camera virtually everywhere I go.

On a more concerning note, the day after our bees swarmed the farmer adjacent to us sprayed all his hay fields with a chemical to kill the roses in the fields.  It is very disturbing to see this behavior as it does jeopardize our bees safety, not to mention the safety of our soil, drinking water, and air (as we can smell the chemical in the air).  Since we grow exclusively organic produce we are always concerned that these chemicals will drift to our crops.  What is even more concerning is the rampant use of round-up in our rural neighborhood.  We see whole fields brown and dead, killed by round up, and then planted without tilling the soil with genetically modified soybeans and genetically modified corn.  Many people link the colony collapse disorder with agricultural chemicals used on crops.  We continue to hold the vision that our swarmed bees found a good home in the forest where the chemicals will not affect them as much, and we continue to plant our hedgerow along the border between our gardens and the farmer's field to protect our organic gardens and our animals from the spraying.