I went out to check on my swarm traps tonight. Last week I had a lot of activity at one trap but I didn't think they had moved in yet. When I turned the corner and saw the trap, it had a huge swarm hanging from the bottom and sides. It was much larger than a basket ball. I ran back to the house, told my wife, and we took a 2 medium, drawn frames, hive out there. I lowered the hive down using the rope, and placed it next to the hive. They were all over the entrance but they did not start marching in. I opened the top and shock them into the hive. It took a long time for them to move in. There is a pure white 4" by 6" piece of comb hanging from the bottom of the hive. That means that they have been in and outside of this trap for at least a week. I left and came back after dinner and put the lid on, it was raining. There was still lots of bees between the hives. Tomorrow, if the weather clears up, I plan on adding another super and put the frames from the trap in the hive with some foundation frames.
Jim
Nice Jim, nothing better than free bees. I have a feeling that after this long cold winter there won't be many swarms around these parts.
Guess I'll have to wait until the blueberry pollinators bring their truck loads in.
It must be darn near impossible to do swarm management on hundreds of hives.
All I have to do is place traps nearby in the woods and wait.
Good going, Jim.
Joe
Quote from: tefer2 on May 03, 2014, 09:08:26 AM
Nice Jim, nothing better than free bees. I have a feeling that after this long cold winter there won't be many swarms around these parts.
Guess I'll have to wait until the blueberry pollinators bring their truck loads in.
It must be darn near impossible to do swarm management on hundreds of hives.
All I have to do is place traps nearby in the woods and wait.
That is where these came from. There are 64 hives that are about 200 feet away. They are here for the gallberry.
Jim
Here is a picture of the swarm.
http://mywcwheels.com/bee345.JPG (http://mywcwheels.com/bee345.JPG)
I thought the bees had filled the nuc and were still hanging on the outside. When I opened the nuc, it was empty. No sign the bees had ever been in side of it.
I opened the hive and shook the rest of the bees into it, there was still a lot of bees between the nuc and the hive.
I went through the hive. They covered 3/4 of the frames. I did not find the queen but if you look at the bottom of the swarm you can see that it is rounded. That is a good sign that the queen is in their.
Jim
That is a lot of confused bees!
Beautiful sight! Makes all your work and effort worthwhile!
It's always a bonus if the bees will come to your house and save you a trip. Congrats!
Quote from: SmokeEater2 on May 05, 2014, 01:50:23 PM
It's always a bonus if the bees will come to your house and save you a trip. Congrats!
Thanks.
So do you just hang the swarm trap? Do the bees care if it moves in the wind? Can you tell that I am new to trapping?
JC
Quote from: greenbtree on May 05, 2014, 05:23:03 PM
So do you just hang the swarm trap? Do the bees care if it moves in the wind? Can you tell that I am new to trapping?
JC
Yeah, I have the same question, I always assumed the trap had to be well secured, thought they wouldn't like a wobbly hive, but I guess I am wrong - which is great, would make getting swarm traps high up much easier!
Jim,
Nice job and thanks for sharing! Hope those bees end up liking the inside of the box as much as the outside....
Did you get a pic of the fresh comb?
Again thanks for sharing.
Quote from: greenbtree on May 05, 2014, 05:23:03 PM
So do you just hang the swarm trap? Do the bees care if it moves in the wind? Can you tell that I am new to trapping?
JC
I've hung them like that, it works good. What they don't want is the entrance not being where they expect it, so it can't spin.
Quote from: greenbtree on May 05, 2014, 05:23:03 PM
So do you just hang the swarm trap? Do the bees care if it moves in the wind? Can you tell that I am new to trapping?
JC
Yes, it just hangs in the wind. I usually do something to make sure that it points in one direction only. You do not want it spinning 360 degrees. This one had the wire up and over the limb. Actually it was too far over the limb. I had a hard time getting it to come down with jerking it. Most of my traps here in town have a hook screwed into a branch and have a pulley and a rope. It is much easier to raise and lower. They spin more so I add a small rope tied to the back of the box and anchored to the tree to keep it from spinning. At the farm, some of them are close enough to the tree to stop the spinning.
Jim
Quote from: Variable on May 05, 2014, 06:27:20 PM
Jim,
Nice job and thanks for sharing! Hope those bees end up liking the inside of the box as much as the outside....
Did you get a pic of the fresh comb?
Again thanks for sharing.
No I didn't. My wife took the pictures and she left before i shook the bees into the hive and exposed the comb.
I won't know if they like the new hive until this weekend.
Jim
Beautiful picture of the swarm. Lovely. Thanks.
JC
when I placed my trap, we tied it to the tree limbs so it wouldn't move. the tree did move three to for inches.
and yes it was only at eye level.
when uniting bring it down they didn't even come out to see what the heck was going on.
these are the ones the got so HOT.
jay
Quote from: sawdstmakr on May 03, 2014, 12:45:00 AM
I went out to check on my swarm traps tonight. Last week I had a lot of activity at one trap but I didn't think they had moved in yet. When I turned the corner and saw the trap, it had a huge swarm hanging from the bottom and sides. It was much larger than a basket ball. I ran back to the house, told my wife, and we took a 2 medium, drawn frames, hive out there. I lowered the hive down using the rope, and placed it next to the hive. They were all over the entrance but they did not start marching in. I opened the top and shock them into the hive. It took a long time for them to move in. There is a pure white 4" by 6" piece of comb hanging from the bottom of the hive. That means that they have been in and outside of this trap for at least a week. I left and came back after dinner and put the lid on, it was raining. There was still lots of bees between the hives. Tomorrow, if the weather clears up, I plan on adding another super and put the frames from the trap in the hive with some foundation frames.
Jim
Update.
I checked on this swarm last night. The front entrance is full of bees and through the STB I can see they are pretty well established. They were bringing in pollen so I will leave them alone. And let them collect their gallberry nectar.
Jim
Greentree and Forest
when putting out traps it is best to hang on a limb (stabilized) the tree won't be it will sway in the breeze.
Bees like that.
Old comb is one of the best attractants ever. Lemon Grass Oil is used too.Queen lure is also used.
In a tree is best. down here many hives are cut out of the ground (water valve boxes, and cable boxes too). I have had three from the ground that do better than in the air swarms.
Update.
This swarm turned into one of my best hives. I went to pull honey 2 weeks ago and this hive has 2 medium boxes of brood and 2 full boxes of honey. They had just started to cap it so it did not remove it. I did load it up in the truck and moved it into town with the rest of my bees. I put a drawn super on it and I hope to get another 2 supers above that before I pull honey again.
Jim
Quote from: tefer2 on May 03, 2014, 09:08:26 AM
Nice Jim, nothing better than free bees. I have a feeling that after this long cold winter there won't be many swarms around these parts.
Guess I'll have to wait until the blueberry pollinators bring their truck loads in.
It must be darn near impossible to do swarm management on hundreds of hives.
All I have to do is place traps nearby in the woods and wait.
Oh yes there is! free bees that are not mean!
Well, I put a couple of traps out and nothing so far. No worries, I figured it would be a rough year after this last winter. Yesterday I was in my beeyard making some nucs, and noticed a lot of activity around my last dead out that I hadn't gotten around to breaking down yet. Figured just robbing, as I had that going on in some of the deadouts off and on. When I got close I saw the bees were all very small, and a lot of them. I popped the top, pulled a frame and saw new nectar in the frame and the hive was packed full of bees. I just slid that frame back in and closed it up. Swarm moved right on in and set up shop. I figure I will let them settle in well before I disturb them with an inspection. Got to love it!
JC