Do Bees Leave Bad Beekeepers?

I’ve been keeping bees as a hobby for many years now. New beekeepers often ask me if bees just pack up and permanently leave their hive if the beekeeper taking care of them makes lots of big mistakes over and over again. These newbies want to know if beehives will totally empty out if the person managing them handles things the wrong way all the time.

While it is true that bees can and do completely leave a hive location once in a while for a bunch of reasons, it’s more complicated than them simply ditching a bad caretaker they don’t like. Based on my years of experience, I don’t think bees are judging their beekeepers that harshly. Here’s what I’ve learned so far about why bees sometimes leave from watching my own hives over time.

Some clear examples of bad beekeeping habits that can harm bee colonies are not ever treating pests and diseases, constantly digging through the brood nest area for no good reason, taking too much honey and leaving the bees with not enough food, and totally ignoring basic maintenance that needs to be done. Handling beehives roughly or aggressively stresses out the bees living inside.

Bees may totally vacate their home hive for a number of reasons. Sometimes colony abandonment does happen partly because of ongoing bad beekeeping practices that hurt the health and home of the bees. But other times, issues pop up with weather, nature, diseases, or other factors that even a really careful and smart beekeeper could not predict or prevent. Bees abandoning their hive to go establish a new home somewhere else is basically their emergency attempt at living better when their current hive conditions become intolerable for survival.

The good news is that beekeepers who realize their lack of knowledge is causing them to do things incorrectly can definitely turn it around and improve their skills, which prevents their remaining bees from leaving too. Getting an experienced mentor, taking a hands-on class, reading detailed books, and finding a beekeeping trainer in their community helps these newbies rapidly correct their hive care methods for the better so their colonies thrive.

I definitely speak from experience here. When I first started out years ago, I did every amateur mistake possible out of pure ignorance! But once I started studying to understand why my hives struggled and asked veterans for guidance, I was able to change what I was doing wrong and get better at managing my colonies well. My bees stuck around and did well once I stopped messing up their care. So even brand new beekeepers with poor skills can absolutely fix their issues before the bees all flee for good. It just takes quickly realizing your mistakes and making the effort to learn proper techniques through education.

Many common beekeeper errors that annoy bees enough to leave can actually be easily avoided from the start by learning some beekeeping fundamentals. Giving colonies adequate ventilation, carefully checking on the bees’ needs each time you inspect the hive, leaving them enough honey for the full year cycle, monitoring the queen’s health constantly, skillfully preventing swarm urges, and sticking to other basic best practices keeps most colonies happy in their home.

While nature and weather cause challenges, keepers should try hard not to make things worse through their own lack of ability. Following the guidelines of great bee care makes it so bees have no reason to think they need to pack up and move out. Absconding should never be normal in a colony cared for properly. Bees want to stick around in a hive that suits them.

Of course, there are still a few cases where bees just naturally want to leave a hive to start new colonies elsewhere that have zero to do with the beekeeper’s skills. One big example is reproductive swarming in the springtime, when bees reproduce by splitting up. Even great beekeepers can’t stop this, since making new colonies is just built into honey bee biology for spreading their population.

When bees seem really frustrated with their current hive spot for some reason, sometimes the best thing an experienced keeper can do is just move the whole hive to a new location that might make the bees happier. If something about the area, weather, predators, or other factors creates problems for the colony, loading them up and transporting them somewhere much better prevents them from feeling they have to flee on their own. While annoying to move an established hive, it can give bees a fresh start they need.

In the cases where I have had swarms or whole colonies take off and leave a hive, sometimes I can get them back quickly if they settle down in a clump nearby that I can actually see. Using a special bee vacuum tool, I might be able to gently suck up runaway bees and return them to the old hive if I act fast enough. But if too much time passes before I recapture an absconded swarm, they often scatter and are gone for good. I’ve learned I need to act very fast if I have any hopes of getting the bees back after losing them.

Finally, in really awful cases where I keep having hives die or leave no matter what I try, often the simplest solution is to totally start over. Removing any diseased remnants, thoroughly cleaning all my equipment, and getting brand new bees shipped in allows me to begin fresh. Attempting to rehabilitate failing hives can lead to disappointment after a certain point. It’s okay to acknowledge sometimes that it’s best to just call it quits on a hive that struggles too much and press reset. Learning from losses and trying again keeps me from getting too frustrated.

The main takeaway for me is that when hives abscond, instead of blaming yourself or the bees, try to just figure out what tangible issues made them leave in the first place. Then do your best as a beekeeper to fix those specific problems. It’s really not about the bees disliking you personally or rejecting you as their caretaker. Bees and beekeepers have to work together cooperatively, and both sides playing their part leads to the best outcome where bees thrive and want to stay.