Absconding swarms and Citizen Science

We're experiencing that wonderful faltering, yet inexorable, transition from winter to spring. The Cheviots are periodically still capped with snow, but the fields are bathed in the songs of skylarks, and the first chiffchaff are back from Africa. Even on the coldest mornings — and it's been -5 °C several times recently — it's clear that the days are lengthening, and the weather is improving.

All of which means that this beekeeper's thoughts turn from the frames I have yet to build to the prospect of queen rearing and swarming. It's a lot easier to get enthusiastic about these topics than it is about my cold, battered fingertips from an ineptly aimed hammer.

I've been very busy scheming how to exploit the maternal effect in honey bees and will write more about this in future posts. But, before then, I want to discuss swarming and, more specifically, why swarms abscond.

To cut a long story short, I don't know why swarms sometimes abscond, but I have some ideas.

I'm not in a position to test these ideas, at least not directly. I only hive one or two swarms a season, and I don't remember any that have absconded.

Phenomenology vs meaningful conclusions

Perhaps I've been lucky?

More likely, this simply reflects the small sample size.

Drawing conclusions from limited numbers of events is liable to result in phenomenology. Unfortunately, beekeeping is rife with examples of this {{1}}. Is there a way to get a larger sample size?

There might be.

Several thousand receive the newsletter from The Apiarist every week and, because many are experienced and all are enthusiastic, it's likely that they collect quite a few swarms during the season.

That's a meaningful sample size. However, before discussing Citizen Science I'll provide some background on the process of swarming, how beekeepers try to prevent absconding, and my 'best guesses' as to why some swarms abscond.