A GIGANTIC swarm of around 20,000 bees sparked chaos when their queen got stuck in a car trunk. It took five different beekeepers, park rangers and passers-by in England to get them off into a cardboard box, only for the wind to blow it off the car and the queen go back into the Outlander’s trunk.
Roger Burns of Pembrokeshire Beekeepers then says the car’s owner returned and drove away with the queen unknowingly trapped in the back, resulting in the swarm taking up the chase – even being spotted on the car’s boot the next day.
“We think the queen had been attracted to something in the car, perhaps something sweet, and had got into a gap on the boot’s wiper blade or perhaps the hinge.
The swarm of around 20,000 had followed her and were sat around on the boot of the car. I brought over a cardboard box and carefully brushed them into there as quickly as possible as I was aware it was a big swarm in the middle of the high street.
Unfortunately I had to go to dinner so another beekeeper took up the watch however eventually the car owner returned and drove off without realising the queen was still hidden in the back.
I have been beekeeping for 30 years and I have never seen a swarm do that. It is natural for them to follow the queen but it is a strange thing to see and quite surprising to have a car followed for two days. It was quite amusing.“
(Photos, Tom Moses; via Metro UK)
