Poll
Question:
How many swarms have you nabbed so far?
Option 1: one
votes: 5
Option 2: two
votes: 9
Option 3: three
votes: 2
Option 4: four or more
votes: 9
Option 5: zilch
votes: 13
I thought it might be interesting for people to post in here when they capture a swarm.
Date, location and size and how many. In a few months we should have some great data to discuss.
Got two June 6 2007.One is pretty large,and the second was probably slightly bigger than a package of bees.
Great idea Mick.
Got two and both came from my hives. First one was last month and big. The second one I got a week ago and very small.
An older beekeeper who has his name out to get swarms, has pluck 17 this year and had several calls for swarms he had to turn down. He said last year he only got 5 or 6. The year before over 20.
Did 5 in April (2nd, two on the 10th, 13th, one late April, can't remember date) and one on May 22. Had one I talked about on the forums about a week ago that I went to harvest and the grasscutter had just sprayed them. Had a call for one on Tuesday, June 5th. The hive relocated by the time I got there in the tree overhead, abot 20' up. When I figure out how to post pictures (way overdue in figuring that out) I will post pics of swarms and cut-outs. Oh, and had one about two weeks ago that I watched re-locate from a window approx. 25' up on this guy's roof to a tree about 60' from there about 20 or so feet up. It was an awesome sight, it always is when yo observe a swarm. This same guy is in Slidell, Louisiana. He is always getting bees, so I set up a swarm trap and we caught one 4 days later. That was not quite 2 weeks ago. I checked on it about a week ago and was amazed at how heavy the trap was. The bees had already built comb inside, the hive had to weigh around 20-25lbs. Anyways, all of these swarms are doing well. I did combine two of these with hives that were queenless. I love swarm calls!
Oops, sorry I forgot to add size of swarms. I found the ones in early April to be smaller in size than up to say mid May. Had one in early April that was two handfuls in size. That one was on a tree about 7' up. Had one in between two lemon trees that was about 2 and a half lbs worth. Had one on the underside of a patio umbrella that I'm guessing had 4 lbs of bees. The largest one was in a very public place at the Riverwalk in New Orleans, on an exposed beam, had to close this area down while I removed them, this swarm had about 6-6 and a half lbs of bees! Had another one in a tree also about 10' up with around 3 lbs of bees. All the swarms are doing great, in fact several are in two deeps now and one with two deeps and a super.
Uhmm, this doesn't count but I thought I heard a swarm in a tree that was blooming, all it was was a bunch of bees buzzing around getting pollen! Their were a ton!
zero. I am on three internet sites for removal, NJBA list, three fire stations and three police departmenst and not one call. I have never seen a bee in my yard until i put a hive in. In my opinion, the only swarms around here are recent swarms from beeks, not feral swarms. I know you southern and western beeks say otherwise, but I have no reason to believe there is a substantial feral polulation here.
2 swarms collected, vollyball-ish size.
2 passed on, 1 passed on to fellow beek.
2 bee trees (partial trap on one, the other...forget it) and 5 structure calls (I'm only doing one of those)
Last year I received 0 calls from my website listing, this year it has been more like 5. Plus about 3 or 4 from my exterminator buddy.
Rick
Caught one the last wk of march. It was a good size one, I thought. Had toadd the 3rd deep to the 2nd week.
Have pulled 2 medium supers and the 3rd is ready.
I put two eight frame boxes, one deep and one medium on it two weeks ago to let them clean up from x-tracting and the next day when I started to take them off, they had done put honey in about half the frames.
The BIG one, Easter week. I mean this one was big. Only had one deep ready so I stuck 3 mediums and a shallow on before they took it. Brood was up in the 2nd medium, 3rd box up by the 2nd week.
Have pulled 2 from it and another is ready and I added another super yesterday.
Back to six boxes high.
doak
0
All the ones I got were from febuary-through begining of may.
Got 2 in May, and one in June, but so far not a lot going on with any of them....
Got a swarm this morning on a fence post in Meraux, Louisiana. It was about a package size.