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📦 Swarm Trap Placement: The Science of Choosing a Winning Site

How box volume, height, entrance size and shade combine to determine whether a swarm trap attracts a passing colony, with a live scout-bee attractiveness score.

Entomology & Insect Behaviour3DAdvanced60 FPS

A 3D bait hive mounted on a tree, where changing box volume, height, entrance size and canopy shade drives a live scout-bee attractiveness score and visibly changes how many scouts circle the entrance.

🔬 What It Demonstrates

Each site factor is scored against the value scout bees are known to prefer — around 40 litres of volume, meaningful height off the ground, a small defensible entrance and moderate shade — and combined into an overall attractiveness percentage.

🎮 How to Use

Adjust volume, height, entrance size and shade and watch the box resize, the entrance change, and scout bees swarm tighter and in greater numbers as the site becomes more attractive. Rotate and zoom to inspect the trap.

💡 Did You Know?

Thomas Seeley's Appledore Island experiments found scouts overwhelmingly preferred roughly 40-litre cavities — close to the internal volume of a standard deep hive box — over both smaller and much larger ones.

⚙ Under the hood

How box volume, height, entrance size and shade combine to determine whether a swarm trap attracts a passing colony, with a live scout-bee attractiveness score.

beesswarmcolonyattractiontrapbiologyThree.js

3D · Three.js / WebGL renderer · 60 FPS target · runs fully client-side, no install