In message <[log in to unmask]>, Jerry
Bromenshenk <[log in to unmask]> writes
>I'm going to be hard to convince on this one.

Once, just once, about 20 years ago we turned up at 3AM to load hives
for a migration. It was still completely dark.

Got out of the truck and got a be in my hair. Turned the torches on
because we could hear bees flying.

The whole yard were working like mad, the flying was fast, and close to
silent, beards of bees were forming on the outside of the hives, and the
rank smell of ripening Lime (Basswood) nectar filled the air. These
hives had been prepared for shifting only two days before.

Came back later the same day and they were stuffed full.

Have seen minor cases of it the last two summers, again on Lime flows
and once only on Himalayan Balsam, but nothing like this memorable
morning in the 1980's.

Sorry to those who are trying to make a case for a fictitious new bee
strain for whatever bizarre reason, these were simply normal black
A.m.m. bees and some Yorks Midnites that I had at the time. They were
all doing it, so it is, in this case at least, down to circumstances
alone, and nothing to do with mysterious racial characteristics.


ps. Those of you who know the Balsam, it is really wierd in the early
half light in the morning as these 'ghost bees' are coming home, perhaps
having been out all night, and arrive back all dusted with white pollen,
as if they had been in a flour tub.
--
Murray McGregor

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