Bumblebee Nest Gets New Home

"You better come see this. There's a bee hive in here!" Paul called to me as he opened up our well house to troubleshoot a sudden loss of water. I was bewildered on how or why honeybees would set up camp in a well house. But since they do occupy attics, house walls and porch floors, I guessed it was possible. But I was wrong.

In her post, Chatham County Extension agent Debbie Roos chronicles the delightful discovery and emergency relocation of a native brown-belted bumble bee nest on our farm. (Debbie's photos are far better than mine - she's a professional photographer!)

She and I were both concerned that the colony might not accept the new location since I basically did everything against the book. But with a plumber was on the way, saving the bees meant trying to move the colony. The insulation they had buried their nest in was soaking wet from pump problems, so relocating was a good option.

Despite our fears (and my janky tools), the bees hardly noticed our presence. Paul and Debbie watched on without any protective gear and no problems. After the fact, I heard from multiple (honey) beekeepers that they experienced painful run-ins with bumble bee nests. We got lucky with a species that was docile and apparently quite agreeable to the move.

The whole process took less than 5 minutes but Debbie and I took turns monitoring the new home over the next few days to see if the bees would abandon or accept it. To our delight, the bees carried on with business as usual bringing in pollen for the expanding colony.

Our farm hosts numerous honeybee colonies for honey and our hive tours, but bumble bees are generally not part of a managed apiary. They are one of our 400 species of native bees in North Carolina and usually live in underground burrows. We see them daily in our flower gardens but never know where their small nests are.

I still check on the bumbles periodically, although I really don't open the hive. Unlike honeybee colonies which overwinter in the same location, bumblebees cast new queens each fall to go off and build a new nest. So I don't expect that this location will be occupied by bumbles again, which makes the whole experience so fleeting and amazing to watch.

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