Well, I new it was getting close but I thought that I would have another week. I don't know if it came from my hives but I suspect it did. I looked out my back yard and saw more bees than normal flying around. So I went to take a look. And before I knew it, I was standing in the middle of a swarm finding a place to land. This is the second swarm that I've caught and there's no way to describe the sensation of thousands of bees flying around you(Yes I'm an addict). This one was much easier to get than my first(No ladder). I watched as they picked a small cherry tree to land on. once I knew were they were going to land, I started to gather the boxes and frames. I got a couple sawhorses and by the time I set box on it and got it set up, the limb they were on was starting to bend. It was only about 8 inches above the box. I don't know how big it was but it was bigger than the 3 lb packages that i got last year. Anyway, one good shake of the branch and in they went. Afterwards, I decided to go through my hives and I found one with capped queen cells. Unfortunately, I crushed a couple getting the frames out. The good news is that I was still able to find seven cells on six frames. Only one frame had two queen cells. i was able to cut off one of them. So I started the day with four hives and ended the day with 5 hives and 6 nucs. Not a bad day. :wink: Hopefully the nucs will do okay. If the swarm came from that hive they would have probably have swarmed again because they were still packed with bees. I guess the only bad thing is that I was going to graft some larva to make some queens but, I don't know If I have enough equipment left for mating nucs.
Congratulations. How many frames were you able to give each nuc?
Jim
Good stuff!
Quote from: sawdstmakr on April 28, 2015, 09:28:55 PM
Congratulations. How many frames were you able to give each nuc?
Jim
I gave the nucs the frame that the Queen cell was on(they had some brood, pollen and nectar) and at least two other frames that were full of nectar. I would have given them some honey but that hive was packed full of nectar but very little capped honey. I also shook some extra bees in each nuc in case the field bees return to the original hive. I did put a jar of sugar on them to just in case they need it.
chris
If your goal is to increase the number of hives, that should work real well.
Jim
Well, brother, I am right across the river from you in Southern Illinois. If you find yourself having an embarrassment of riches, let me know! I will take a pesky hive or two so you won't have to bother with them.