112 
Psyche 
[June-September 
earliest stages of signalling the location of the new nest entrance. 
This is logical, for at first only the scouts know the entrance loca¬ 
tion, and in nature the entrance opening—a small knothole, a little 
gap among the roots of a tree, or a narrow crack in a limb—can be 
quite inconspicuous. Thus, once the scouts had directed the swarm 
to the vicinity of the new nest site, they dropped out of the swarm 
cloud to pinpoint the nest’s entrance chemically. The early 
unmarked scenters had probably scouted the nest site, but had not 
danced at the swarm cluster. 
The remaining details of the swarm’s entry into the nest cavity are 
presented in Fig. 3. In general summary, within 3 min of the swarm’s 
arrival, bees had blanketed the nestbox’s outer surface and were 
streaming into the nest cavity at nearly 7 bees/sec, forming a twist¬ 
ing, whirlpool-like swirl of bees flowing into the entrance. In 9 min 
the queen entered. The bees did not require her presence in the nest 
to move inside, as they had to fly there. Within 10 min about 90% of 
the bees had entered, and finally, within 30 min of lift-off, nearly all 
11,000 bees were safely inside their new home. 
Acknowledgments 
We thank Dave De Jong, Robin Hadlock, Chris Kelley, Richard 
Nowogrodzki, Ken Ross, Jim Soha, and Lucia Turillo for help in 
chasing flying swarms. The Shoals Marine Laboratory community 
kindly tolerated hordes of honey bees zooming across their island. 
Supported by the American Philosophical Society. 
Summary 
The social organization of honey bee swarm flight was studied 
throughout the period extending from completion of nest site selec¬ 
tion, through cross-country flight, to entry into the nest cavity. First 
the scouts, numbering about 5% of the swarm, return from the nest 
site to the swarm cluster. Thus they are present at lift-off to guide 
the swarm’s flight. Buzzing runs at the nest site trigger their return. 
Lift-off takes less than 60 sec and is also stimulated by buzzing runs. 
The airborne swarm forms a circular cloud about 10 m in diameter 
and 3 m high. The flight starts very slowly, but accelerates to a 
velocity of 11 or more km/h. Some scouts pilot the swarm, appar¬ 
ently by performing streak flights through the swarm cloud, while 
others fly ahead to the new nest’s entrance and release assembly 
