How many bees are there in a swarm? ,how many birds in a flock?

Question

How many bees are there in a swarm? ,how many birds in a flock?

Answer 1

New honey bee colonies are formed when queen bees leave the colony with a large group of worker bees, a process called swarming. The first or prime swarm generally goes with the old queen. As soon as the swarm is established as a new colony, the bees raise a new queen, or sometimes a replacement virgin queen is already present in the swarm. Afterswarms are usually smaller and are accompanied by one or more virgin queens. Sometimes a beehive will swarm in succession until it is almost totally depleted of workers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swarming_(h...

So you must be talking colony or bee hive !!

Highly eusocial bees live in colonies. Each colony has a single queen, many workers and, at certain stages in the colony cycle, drones. When humans provide the nest, it is called a hive. A honey bee hive can contain up to 40,000 bees at their annual peak, which occurs in the spring, but usually have fewer.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bee

Birds in a flock

Flock (birds)

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Red-billed Queleas form enormous flocks—sometimes tens of thousands strong.A flock is a group of birds conducting flocking behavior in flight, or while foraging. The term is akin to the herd amongst mammals. The benefits of aggregating in flocks are varied and flocks will form explicitly for specific purposes. Flocking also has costs, particularly to socially subordinate birds, which are bullied by more dominant birds; birds may also sacrifice feeding efficiency in a flock in order to gain other benefits.[1] The principal benefits are safety in numbers and increased foraging efficiency. Defense against predators is particularly important in closed habitats such as forests where predation is often by ambush and early warning provided by multiple eyes is important, this has led to the development of many mixed-species feeding flocks.[2] These multi-species flocks are usually composed of small numbers of many species, increasing the benefits of numbers but reducing potential competition for resources.

Group size is a major aspect of the social environment of gregarious animals.

In Denmark, there is a biannual phenomenon known as Black Sun (Danish: Sort Sol), when flocks of European Starlings gather in vast numbers, creating complex shapes against the sky.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flock_(bird...

Flock of birds

http://www.animalpicturesarchive.com/Arc...

http://www.wilddelaware.com/wp-content/l...

Bees in a beehive/colony

http://www.bushkillfarms.com/gallery2/d/...

http://thinkorthwim.com/wp-content/uploa...

Answer 2

Swarm does not refer to the number of bees. It's actually bee terminology for describing the weather. Mostly seen in Africanized populations. ie. "It sure bee swarm today."

As for birds/flock - 1 is a bird, 2 is a couple of birds, 3+ would be a flock