# Groups of Swarms



## reidflys (Jan 14, 2011)

I was told by a lady that 80 years ago swarms would travel together in groups, and that you would see 10 swarms altogether in Tennessee. She remembered parents having to keep their kids inside when the swarms would travel through together. (Does anyone else remember this, or was she pulling my leg?)


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## Eikel (Mar 12, 2014)

Never heard of it but wouldn't a freight train of swarms to be a thing to see?!


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## aunt betty (May 4, 2015)

Sounds like you met my mother. She tells some real woppers.


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## naturebee (Dec 25, 2004)

reidflys,
Yes, from a laymen point of view, her interpretation 
of swarms traveling together is explainable.

In those days feral bee colonies were very numerous
circa 1909 ; "In removing the timber from three
acres of land the owner found nine bee trees with 
bees and honey."

Imagine now 640 acres per square mile how many
feral colonies could be throwing swarms on a nice
day, particularly after a period of rainy days.
It could seem to a laymen that bees are swarming
and traveling together, as they would be everywhere.

-Joe
https://www.facebook.com/Historical.Honeybee.Articles/


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## reidflys (Jan 14, 2011)

Your history of beekeeping page is amazing. My birthday is tax day, I loved the bees and taxes part!! It's hard to think that bees may have behaved differently in the past. And not just the German Black Bee angle. Saint Modomnoc's bees followed him onto a boat, and there's a few writings of that happening. My bees look in my windows, but they don't follow me!!


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## Michaeljp86 (May 19, 2016)

My uncle told me when he was a young boy a cloud of bees like in a cartoon flew over. His uncle told him to go get grandpa. He did and they went in the direction the bees were going and sure enough they found some in a peach tree. My great grandpa put a empty hive under the limb and knocked them off into it and got a good hive out of it.


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## Son of Pete (Feb 18, 2017)

I can believe it. Two weeks ago I walked down to my hives, and saw one beginning to swarm. I watched as the cloud filled the air, and then they settled in a Brazilian pepper at the back corner of my lot. So I ran and got a box and the rest of the stuff I needed to catch them. When I came back, I saw that my swarm was hanging about 5 feet away from another ball of bees in the same pepper tree. Got em both!


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## Greeny (Jun 27, 2016)

I have a friend in her 80s. She says when she was a child that they would have to stay inside on 'swarm days'.


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## FlowerPlanter (Aug 3, 2011)

There are some old videos on you tube of how German bees were kept in skeps made with straw and cow manure. I believe these were some of the first bees here in North America don't think there' any left now. 
In the video the keeper waits for the swarms that all seem to happen the same day and time during swarm season each year, it also looks like they clump on top of each other while swarming. If you watch the videos you might see how she might say that. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCt6bV7owYs


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