Bee Hive

The number of individuals within a honey bee colony depends largely upon seasonal changes – a colony could easily reach up to 50,000 individual honeybees during the active season – when workers search for food, store honey for winter and build combs; with this population decreasing during colder seasons. When a healthy hive becomes too populated, the hive will breed an additional Queen bee. The old queen then leaves the hive with some of the colony to make another one, leaving the new queen to continue laying eggs for the existing hive. We have two types of bee hives – feral beehives are cavities occupied by honey bee colonies that occur naturally in nature, such as hollowed-out trees; while domesticated honey bees live in man-made beehives. In South Africa, when the old queen leaves the hive she might find residence in either a natural cavity, or an empty man-made hive, placed specifically to offer a destination for a swarm.