Help During Swarm Season
Swarm season is now full-blown, just like our spring. Beekeepers are available to safely capture and hive swarms. In Alameda County, call the Alameda County Beekeepers Association swarm coordinator, Robert Hapke at 510-393-1762. He will find someone to take care of this safely for you.
If you find a swarm, here's what you should know:
Swarms are very very unlikely to sting.
This is how bee colonies reproduce. This swarm is looking for a new home.
The swarm may stay for only a half day; it may decide to build comb and establish a new hive right where it is.
The swarm is valuable to the environment, because bees are helpful pollinators. There are many people who would like to give this colony a home.
If you find a swarm:
1. Reassure neighbors and passersby. If possible, block off an area with a radius of five or more feet from the swarm, more so no one harms the swarm than to protect people.
2. Call a beekeeper or bee club immediately. If you get voicemail, leave complete information: Location; details such as under the eaves, in a tree, how high up; how big the swarm is; whether a ladder is needed and whether you can provide it; your contact info.
You will be doing a good deed for the bees and for all of us!
Comments
I have a very small swarm that comes and goes, as the sun and day warm up, then the night grows cool. Last year, Bill Baty took a large swarm off one of our window lintels.
My big problem is that some of the tenants are deathly afraid of the bees and severly allergic, and they want them gone at all costs. I don't want to exterminate, but there doesn't seem to be much of a way to quarantine the bees from the tenants.