Sellers on Ebay tend to 'hide' the fact that a hive actually contains bees and I think they are still not supposed to sell them on there but seem to get away with it.
As far as swarms are concerned, they are very variable in quality and I would never consider selling one. I did hear of someone that was collecting swarms and selling them on as nucs and found that he had EFB in the apiary; believed to be from a swarm, and had no idea where his customers came from so had no record for the bee inspectors to follow up. Very poor practice indeed!
There is also a seller on Ebay who is selling a box of bumblebees as pets. They have apparently sold loads of them. It looks like they are imported and bumblebees are supposed to be used commercially for fruit pollination within greenhouses to contain them so they don't pass pathogens to the local bumblebee community rather than put in the garden as a talking point. I twice messaged the company enquireing whether the bees were imported. No reply came back.
As far as swarms are concerned, they are very variable in quality and I would never consider selling one. I did hear of someone that was collecting swarms and selling them on as nucs and found that he had EFB in the apiary; believed to be from a swarm, and had no idea where his customers came from so had no record for the bee inspectors to follow up. Very poor practice indeed!
There is also a seller on Ebay who is selling a box of bumblebees as pets. They have apparently sold loads of them. It looks like they are imported and bumblebees are supposed to be used commercially for fruit pollination within greenhouses to contain them so they don't pass pathogens to the local bumblebee community rather than put in the garden as a talking point. I twice messaged the company enquireing whether the bees were imported. No reply came back.
May your bees read the same books as you do.