Interesting. Both hives were facing front (holes at the front) with a wall behind them. I broke one without silk touch and 3 angry bees came out. I broke the other with silk touch and placed it in the middle of the room without walls touching, and 3 bees popped out.
I made another duplicate of the world and silk touched both hives and placed one with a wall on its left and one with a wall on its right. Bees came out of both. Then I placed them with their front covered by a wall and, as expected, they did not come out. I put them back in their original position and they came out-as if they had now been reset and working properly.
However, I started this journey after I placed them with campfires under them and no bees, then took the campfires away but still no bees. Perhaps the campfires locked them in their hives and, even when I took the campfires away (which I did without removing the hive) the bees were still in a locked state?
So I started again and placed them on campfires. No bees. Broke the campfires under them. No bees. Broke the hives and replaced them in the same spot, bees came out. So it seems it's an interaction with the campfire. Thanks for your questions which led me to testing!
The exit sides are open to an air block and the hives were placed in the day. I waited through several days and bees never came out.. I lured more bees into the enclosed space and they went in to the hives, and again they never came out.
On PS5, Realms, right before the 1.18, we had never experienced any issues with disappearing villagers or animals. We had the usual farms and villager trading halls-no issues. Been playing on console since the takeover from 4J, no issues. We started a new realm after 1.18 dropped and suddenly, we can't go beyond one map or something disappears. Really randomly. 2 sheep once from my 18 sheep. One of two pandas, in a fence. A villager here and a villager there. It's very disconcerting and I read here that this bug has been happening for years so it makes me concerned that it's elusive and, now that it's happened to me, will be pervasive.
I though it might be a spawn issue but my partner is on another map and just recently went into another dimension over several maps and when he returned, 2 of his 3 villagers were gone.
I would be happy to give you access to our current, bugged, 1.18 or previous 1.17 realm where it did not happen.
Further to this issue, I have consistently been able to not have my boat disappear when surrounded by sand on three sides: front, one side, bottom. Otherwise, my boat disappears. This happens on both single player and realms.
PS4 new Bedrock update has raids spawning in caves. We are on a mess plateau and created a village at the top. When we start a raid, on occasion they spawn on the surface but some waves are below ground
Ok, I did one final test. I placed the campfire after I placed the beehive. No change, bees still did not come out. Breaking the fire stick did but release the bees but silk touching and replacing the beehive released the bees again.