Back from the dead

[tefer2]

We had a heck of a wind storm here late Saturday night. So Sunday morning I thought I would check some hives. While walking around, I noticed that the girls had placed some dead bodies on the landing boards.

 I continued my walk to the back of that yard and started back to the van.
When passing those hives I wondered what may have killed those bees. So I put them in my coat pocket to take home.

My plan was to look at them with my new microscope that I just got over the holidays as a gift.
While driving home I noticed that the radio had this darn buzzing sound coming from the speaker.
I tried to tune it better and finally just gave up and turned it off.

That's when I noticed that the buzzing sound was coming from my coat. Three of those dead bees had come back to life and were really mad. I thought to myself, your gonna get stung you knucklehead.

 I opened my pocket and they flew to the windshield. I then captured them in a Mcdonalds coffee cup. They survived the night on some fresh honey and were still alive this morning.

 I can't believe they came back to life. Maybe they were out for cruise and got chilled. Anyway, my wife had a good chuckle over that story. Also said I should look into a hearing aid.
Next time, I'm going to just stuff them back in the hole! Lesson learned.

[kathyp]

as i was told after bringing many "dead" bees into my house on some frames....they are not dead until they are warm and dead! 

[tefer2]

The wife wanted to know how I heard them over the radio. I asked her if she ever trapped a bee in her veil or glove. They are 3 times louder than normal when mad.
I also took those bees back to that yard and dumped them into a nuc.

[BlueBee]

One of my mating nucs was the same way.  The whole nuc looked like it was as dead as dead gets.  I took it into the heated barn to count how many dead bees were in the nuc.  The next day I find the bees crawling around.

It would be interesting to know how long frozen bees can actually survive before there is no chance of recovery.  If they aren’t moving, they’re not making any heat of their own and hence the only chance they have for survival in that case is solar gain on a warm winter day.  Problem is I doubt they can survive in the frozen state for more than a couple of days, but I really don’t know. 

I have also revived individual bees with a heat gun before, but they didn’t live long.

[Moots]

Very Interesting!  I guess the old medical saying for people applies to bees also..."You're not dead until you're warm and dead".

[Nature Coast Beek]

That's how street magicians do the "resurrection" trick. They place flies in a cooler so they look like they're "belly-up". They then place them on a sill and "happen" upon them. Once they put the fly in their hand their body temp warms up and they "come back to life" and fly away.

[T Beek]

I've been picking up and holding seemingly dead bees found in the snow for several years now, about one in 10 comes back to live a little while longer.

And I learned 'not to count out' any colony until June, or it starts to smell   

Bees found in the snow seldom make it back to their hive, but it gives a beek an opportunity to inspect a 'live' bee for a while in the middle of winter.

[T Beek]

Very Interesting!  I guess the old medical saying for people applies to bees also..."You're not dead until you're warm and dead".

Its why drowning victim survival rates are higher if the water was cold.  Slows everything down.