Many wealthy households kept bee colonies at their country estates and it was a tradition to inform the bees of anything that occurred in the household from marriages, births, deaths, etc. It was thought that the bee would share the appropriate emotions for the event. In particular, if someone in the household died, they would cover the hives with black crepe as they told or sang to the bees. As well there were multiple occurrences of the hives even dying if no one told them about the death.

Here is jstor on the telling of the bees.