Bee swarm visits, leaves a pristine waxen gift

Itʻs June and that means the beehives are overfull with bees--swarm season.

Iʻve had two swarms come through my yard this week. One took up residence in an old empty hive box, but the other was just passing through.

A basketball sized bunch of bees hung under a loulu palm frond for a few hours this morning.

They were not aggressive. I could walk right up and photograph them. 

And then they seemed to get message--perhaps scout bees had found a likely home. 

A bunch of them left the clump and swirled up into the air. And then the swarm came apart, fist-sized clumps of bees falling off and flying up into the air.

They swirled up in a great buzzing storm, right above the palm tree on which they had perched.

The cloud of bees began extending itself to the south, and in another minute, they were gone.

Swarm hangs under loulu frond

The only evidence that they had been there was a cell-phone-sized pristine white wax comb.

Swarm starts to break up, leaving the palm.

All the remains is a bit of wax comb.