Today is extremely humid in our locality after the brief rain it increased even more. It is hard to breath outdoors and one of my strongest hives is acting accordingly to regulate internal humidity and temperature by "bearding" infront of the hive entrance. It is very common that newbee beekeepers immediately assume that this means swarming but it is far from it. If bees are swarming they are pouring out the entrance in a cloud of bees settling nearby the hive either on a tree branch or a tall-ish structure in the hive's vicinity.
Strong colonies have way too many bees between the combs and when humidity increases their bodies act as a barrier so the humidity is kept inside. There is also to take their respiration increasing the inner humidity levels. So the best way to deal with this issues to get out of the hive and let the ventilator bees reduce the internal humidity and bring it down to desired level. Hence bearding.
Thistles are in full bloom. "Lots" of good forage for the bees in this
danish mono-crop barren landscape
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