As the bees swarm in D.C., he answers the call

Delwyn Voss, a volunteer with the D.C. Beekeepers Alliance, helps calm people when clouds of honeybees cause panic.

Updated May 2, 2024 at 9:16 p.m. EDT|Published May 2, 2024 at 10:00 a.m. EDT

Delwyn Voss checks a frame of foraging bees, which bring nectar and pollen back to a beehive, at his home on Capitol Hill. (Valerie Plesch for The Washington Post)

7 min

Honeybees darted by Delwyn Voss’s head as he stood on the roof of his rowhouse garage on Capitol Hill. Half a dozen came to rest on his shirt.

Suddenly, his smartphone rang.

It was a two-word message from the D.C. Beekeepers Alliance: “Get ready.”

A swarm needed corralling.

Every year, just before the weather warms in the D.C. region, queens lay their eggs at the rate of 1,500 a day, overcrowding colonies. When the nectar begins flowing from spring flowers, thousands of bees fly out in search of a new home. They swarm trees, buildings, parked cars — anything that they can land on — eliciting curses and screams from terrified people.