The millions of bees that were abuzz in western New Brunswick on Monday have been returned to their beekeeper in Ontario.

Beamsville, Ont., beekeeper Charlie Parker ships millions of honeybees to New Brunswick annually to pollinate blueberry crops.

On Monday, a transport truck carrying more than 12 million of his insects tipped on the Trans-Canada Highway near Saint-Léonard, setting tens of thousands free.

Police and bee experts sent to the scene were able to capture most of the bees and send them back to Parker. But it is estimated about 100,000 of the insects weren't recaptured and loaded onto a second transport truck that was returned to southern Ontario.

The bees were still a little shaken up on Wednesday, Parker said.

"But once they get working, they'll settle down."

Getting the bees off the transport truck when they arrived back in Ontario on Tuesday night was "ugly," Parker said.

"We had to use a lot of smoke. They'd been on that truck for an extra day and they were jolted and rehandled and everything else. They were a little ugly, but they'll settle down," he said.

Parker owns more than 6,500 hives and has been shipping truckloads of them to New Brunswick for about six years.

"Really no beekeeper really likes to move bees. It's a hard job and the bees get ugly but you do it because that's where you can make some money. You can make a living doing it that way," Parker said.

Parker said he will be giving the bees a few days to settle down before he checks to see how many were actually lost.

'At risk to the elements'

Thousands of the bees were killed by spraying soapy water on them after they didn't re-enter the hives for transport by nightfall on Monday, said RCMP Const. Eric White.

"They couldn't leave a cloud of them lying around," White said.

The bees that did leave the area are unlikely to have travelled more than about two kilometres from where the truck overturned, Parker said.

The bugs that made a beeline for freedom are also unlikely to survive very long, said Richard Duplain, vice-president of the New Brunswick Beekeepers Association.

"Weather conditions, birds and so forth would take a toll on the unprotected bees," Duplain said Monday. "They don't create their own paper nest like wasps or hornets or bumblebees. They're pretty much at risk to the elements if they're not under the care and attention of an experienced beekeeper."

The bees don't usually sting unless they are being bothered and they die after they do, he said.

Two professional bee handlers have also been remained in Saint-Leonard to handle any bee complaints.