Today I watched as a bee expert from the UA helped the Shiloh Museum of Ozark History in Springdale with a bee problem.

The museum staff said the bees swarmed out of a tree on the property Wednesday and then landed on a branch on the ground near the museum’s cabin.

The museum called an expert and Don Steinkraus, a professor in the Department of Entomology in Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences at the University of Arkansas, showed up to collect the bees.

Steinkraus said the swarm was small, probably about 8,000 bees, and had gathered around the queen bee on the tree branch. According to Steinkraus the bees are Apis mellifera or honeybees and he will take the colony back to his lab to research honeybee disease.

How did he collect them, vigorous shaking of the limb they were on. Bees went everywhere but no one was stung. Pretty cool to watch and made a slow day interesting.