Coming up on my 1st full year, how do you know a swarm? Do your bees leave hive?
In full force leaving you a handful of bees and a newly hatched queen.
If you're lucky enough to be present when the swarm takes off, it sounds like an airplane taking off. There's no mistaking that it's a swarm.
Yes, your bees will leave your hive. But if it's a small swarm and you didn't see it leave, then all you may notice is that you can't find your queen and you don't see any eggs. That's where the patience comes in, waiting until the new queen gets mated and starts laying. That could take a couple of weeks.
Terry, where are you? Could you add your location to your profile? How many hives do you have?
And welcome, by the way! :)
A missed small swarm could go un-noticed by new beek. Not always a big difference within the hive already pretty populated. You should see lots of queen cells though (before the swarm). They are open a little while after the swarm as the first one to come out will open the other cells and kill 'les pretendants au trone'.
The best when you see queen cells is to split to make them believe they have swarmed, hence not missing on the swarm and not losing part of your force. If you do not want to increase, re-unite after the swarm impulse has passed (few weeks) In the meantime they have built nicely and strongly for you and they'll go gangbuster; bee ready to add supers
I still remember seeing my first swarm come out of the hive. I was mowing the grass and I just turned off the mower and watched in amazement. From my experience, it seems that my bees will roll out of the hive by the thousands and crawl about half way up the hive body before taking flight. It starts off slow, but withing minutes the whole yard is full of bees flying in a wide circle. Once they are all out they condense the circle and start to move where they will stay for a few hours before moving to their new home. I have never been able to catch, follow or keep up with a hive once it moves that second time!