[logicallycompromised]

there are various circumstance which can bring about these conditions, some natural and others we are ashamed to admit. will they try to drift into other colonies especially if they are all from same mother? do they die a lonely, miserable death?

i was not able to place an empty box with frames to catch the drift from foragers who had yet to return and those that may drift back in the coming days. i would estimate the cluster of foragers without a home around 1000 at the old location.

thank you for your time!

 

[Gypsi]

go pick up the ball of bees tonight, take a box and a brush and a red flashlight

 

[logicallycompromised]

we had some thunderstorms move in earlier and i just got back from checking on them. i am kinda happy to not see them around as i can start to worry less about their possible demise; out of sight, out of mind in a couple months

where may these bees have gone? some of these bees were approaching the end of their life, is there a chance i crippled their will to push on? i suspect not, as most animals do not display a weak psyche that humans do; i.e. they fight till the end. but tossed the idea out there as i want to try and understand what may have come of them.

any ideas?

 

[Tim KS]

Not to worry. Thousands of bees die every day in & around my apiary....but then thousands of new bees are hatching & maturing every day too....the circle of life. You just gave it a bit of a kick start. :lookout:

Some may have begged their way into other local hives to live out their usefulness.

 

[bushpilot]

In an apiary, I believe most eventually find their way into another hive.

 

[logicallycompromised]

this possibility is comforting and will help me sleep at night, thank you!!

 

[logicallycompromised]

pleasant update:
i noticed the closest colony who was recently mated from the same queen as the homeless foragers was bearding; 100f+heat wave. i opened the box to see it full of bees and assume those homeless foragers have moved in and been accepted. they had around 5 frames of bees before the events that brought about this thread.

in the next week i will address the large reason why this came about to prevent it from happening again. for those curious, i made a square langstroth box on short notice(premature beekeeper)and i wanted to faze it out to only have equipment that is universally accepted in the apiary; lang deeps. i will upcycle the wood into bottom boards. if the box was a lang deep, i would have just picked the whole thing up and moved it to the other location rather than just the frames from the recently mated split.