Prefer the Guardian on Google<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n After a series of record-breaking <\/a>US heatwaves<\/a>, the 2026 bee swarm season in North America has started 17 days earlier than last year, pushing beekeepers to adapt to a rapidly shifting season while raising new questions about how honeybees are responding to the climate crisis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to a new report<\/a> published by Swarmed, a tracking network of more than 10,000 beekeepers, focused on safe and ethical honeybee relocation, this year\u2019s unusually early swarm season follows several years of record colony declines worldwide.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Bee swarming is a natural reproductive process that typically occurs in spring in response to overcrowding and limited space within the hive. During swarming, a colony splits into two or more groups as the original queen leaves with approximately half of the worker bees to establish a new hive, while the remaining bees stay behind to rear a new queen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Honeybee overcrowding has already become a problem<\/a> for wild bees. Because honeybee populations are artificially elevated, they often outcompete wild bees for nectar and pollen, especially in environments where resources are limited. This places additional pressure<\/a> on wild bee species, which are already experiencing far steeper population declines.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n The early start to this year\u2019s swarm season follows the largest honeybee die-off<\/a> in recorded US history,<\/a> when beekeepers reported losing more than 60% of their colonies<\/a> last year. Such an impact has hit the US agriculture sector particularly hard, as it relies heavily on bees for crop pollination, which contributes roughly $15bn in added crop value.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Recent research has pointed to the parasitic varroa mite<\/a>, which appears to be increasingly resistant to the chemicals used to control it, allowing the pest to spread viruses by attaching itself to worker bees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mateo Kaiser, Swarmed\u2019s managing director, said: \u201cWe saw a very warm winter in the west this year and \u2026 this is having an impact on bees. They are waking up earlier and in many parts of California, they are building up their populations already in January, December, and that is leading to swarms way earlier than normally.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Kaiser pointed to the growing threat posed by the varroa mite, alongside the role the climate crisis may be playing in shifting bees\u2019 reproductive cycles \u2013 changes that are increasingly forcing beekeepers to rethink how they manage colonies through the year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Explaining how the mites weaken hives, Kaiser said: \u201cAs the baby matures, the varroa mite is eating the fat body of the bee and so a weaker bee is born and the colony overall is weaker and more susceptible to disease.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n He noted that bees traditionally stop laying eggs during winter, creating a natural pause that helps suppress mite populations by limiting places for them to reproduce. But warmer and shorter winters <\/a>may be disrupting that cycle, with some colonies now breeding year-round and swarming earlier than usual \u2013 conditions that could also accelerate varroa mite reproduction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIf we are seeing all of a sudden \u2026 [that] the bees are laying eggs all year round because the climate is warming, and they are swarming earlier because of it, then this may also point to varroa mites reproducing at unprecedented rates \u2026 It will be interesting to look at how this early season connects to this year\u2019s winter losses,\u201d he said.skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Echoing Kaiser, Noah Wilson-Rich, a behavioral ecologist and founder of the bee health non-profit the Urban Bee Lab<\/a>, said: \u201cIn terms of the environment, in terms of the blooms, the timing is what is shifting with climate change.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Drawing on Swarmed\u2019s data, particularly from regions experiencing hotter winters and lower precipitation, Wilson-Rich said earlier springs were allowing flowers to bloom sooner, pushing beehives to mature and reproduce earlier as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey are hitting their fertility point much sooner in a way that matches those other floral patterns of timings that we\u2019re seeing and expecting,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"Beekeeper](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/ae9b00cbb1c18df13dab4cf1cbc301aca709f794\/270_0_1606_1284\/master\/1606.jpg?width=460&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=81f82bc87718bf9a34afcbc088240a04\")
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