Shepley First School has become a hive of activity after pupils became bee keepers.

Children in Class 3 have now have their very own hand-built hive.

But the project to develop their own colony suffered a blow when half the bees flew away.

Teacher Dan Price said: “We had a setback as we had a swarm and half the colony has cleared off.

“It’s perfectly natural, it gets to the point where the queen gets kicked out and some of the bees decide to go with her.”

Mr Price said a spectacular shaped swarm had swooped to a tree at the end of the school garden.

“We’d done a lot of research and we knew it might happen,” he said.

“It was completely unplanned but it was a fantastic way to learn about their lifecycle.

“We’ve got some new queens on the way so we’ll hopefully be back on track next year.”

Mr Price said the six and seven-year-old children had helped to build the hive and were enjoying tending to the bees and learning about pollination and the importance of bees to growing.

And he said he’d been impressed that none of the children had been afraid of the bees, despite the dramatic turn of events.

“I thought the children would be nervous about bee-keeping as it’s quite something to see them all buzzing there,” he said.

“But they’ve loved putting the suits on and going out to the hive to check on the bees.

“They’ve got to be really quiet and I was amazed that no one got scared being so close to thousands of buzzing bees; they can get agitated when you lift the lid off.

“They’ve learned that bees are something that we need to look after so it’s been a positive thing in lots of ways.”

The school is hoping that the new colony of bees will hang around long enough to produce some honey some time next year.