Beelining

Stan has been tinkering with his Beelining box again today. It's pretty cool.

For those who don't know, Beelining is a method to find feral honeybee colonies. You catch some bees in a specialized "beelining box," then fill their tummy (honey sac) with sugar water.  This makes them want to fly back to their colony to empty the honey into some comb.

Then you release one bee and watch it fly and chase it as far as you can. When you loose sight of the bee, you release another, then chase it, etc . . . until you end up back at the colony.

Here is a beelining box we purchased from Jim Fischer. It has 3 compartments with little doors.

Here is the box with the little doors open.

The bottom compartment opens to catch a flower with a bee on it. Then you quickly close the door, catching the bee.

  

 There is a one-way funnel that lets bees climb into the second compartment.

 The second compartment has a little sponge filled with sugar syrup, which bees can drink to fill their stomaches.

Bees crawl through a second one-way funnel into the third compartment. This compartment attracts bees because they are attracted to the light.

A door on the top opens to let out bees. 

 The back opens up to fill the sponge.