Tonight I thought I’d pay the girls a visit to make sure they had enough water. I tend to do little things like this at night on the assumption the girls are all in the hive quietly. I was wrong.
To my complete surprise I found a bunch of the girls busily buzzing around the entrance to the hive. A series of thoughts went through my head… were they getting ready to swarm? Were they being invaded by ants (there are a few, but not enough to worry them at the moment… more on that in a future post!).
So I snapped this video and shot it to my mate Simon for advice.
To my relief he had a good explanation. That was the air conditioning crew hard at work keeping the hive cool… Wow!
I knew they had heater bees when the hive starts getting cold. In that case they flex their thorax, which is a bit like us doing isometric exercises… the body warms up, but the wings don’t flap. That means the heat stays put rather than escaping the hive.
The aircon crew are similar, but in this case they do flap their wings, aiming to create airflow through the hive to cool it down after a hot day.
After the chat I went back out and dropped the ventilation board by a notch to let more air in, and the girls all promptly marched back inside… what lovely manners they have 😉
So there you go – another function the bees serve in keeping their hive healthy! Such amazing creatures.
Cool!
I've Got To Write This Shit Down! 