Midwinter Cleansing Flight

This video was taken on January 21, 2017, an unseasonably warm day here in northeast Indiana. Temperatures rose above 50 degrees, and the bees were out stretching their wings.

Honeybees are meticulously clean creatures. They never defecate in the hive. On sunny, windless days in winter, if the temperatures are warm enough, they’ll emerge from their winter cluster for a “cleansing flight.”