July 16: Bearding and Festooning

It's been really hot in Ohio for the last few days. It was 91 degrees yesterday. The last couple evenings after dark (when watering flowers), I've noticed that a lot of bees have been congregating at the front entrance of both hives. This is called bearding and bees do it when they get too hot. If you were in a hot building without air conditioning (and you've been flapping your wings all day), you would like taking a break to get some fresh air too! It was a bit scary the first time I saw them gathering at the entrance, because I thought they were getting ready to swarm.

Temperature and humidity regulation is an important activity inside the bee house. Bees fan their wings to produce a convection draft into and up the hive. You wouldn't think those tiny wings would actually make that much of a difference, but bees do a great job keeping their homes at a constant temperature, winter and summer.

I hate the heat and humidity of Ohio summers. I'm assuming the bees hate it too (they certainly do have to work harder), so I may have gone a bit overboard with ensuring ventilation: the Russians have the front entrance without a reducer, 2 drilled entrance holes and the top cover is propped up.

In the picture to the right, you can see an interesting festooning formation. What they are doing?

Did you know? People have long claimed that honey bees "shouldn't" be able to fly from an aerodynamic perspective. False! "the secret of honeybee flight is the unconventional combination of short, choppy wing strokes, a rapid rotation of the wing as it flops over and reverses direction, and a very fast wing-beat frequency."