modified post ::1st swarm questions

[malabarchillin]

I just watched (and heard) my first swarm leave from one of my hives. It landed 50 feet way, ten feet up in one of my maple trees. I believe I caught it. I put it in a 10 frame deep and put it with the rest of my hives. Question is :
The swarm hive is now placed 10 feet from where they swarmed from. What keeps the foragers coming back to the new place 10 feet away vs where they are use to returning to ?
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_PFDSe_fBOyc/SN0W6cHsF8I/AAAAAAAABGo/mxjaO44AzEA/s1600-h/P9260002.jpg
In pic the left most hive is the newly housed swarm. The right most hive is where they swarmed from.

Added:  If I want to combine swarm with a existing nuc do I need to wait a while or could I pinch the swarm queen (older) and sit a existing nuc on top with newspaper to catch my fall flow and have fewer stronger hives ?
Regards
Mike


http://mikesfarm1.blogspot.com/
My bee blog

[mtman1849]

I would think that the bees that left the hive with the queen would stay with her because of her pheromone but you may have a few bees still return to the old hive location

[rdy-b]

sometimes you have to let the bees that have swarmed stay out from a new home for atleast a day-or they dont fell they have successfully swarmed and will swarm again -sometimes they get right down to business and there is no problem -hiving them that soon after they have swarmed i think i would have turned the box so it atleast faces the opposite direction in till they latched on then you can turn it back the same way -sometimes there is just no telling what will happen  ;) RDY-B

[rdy-b]

the swarm at this time of year is a cast swarm not a prime swarm so the chances of the queen being virgin is very high-learning the difference between prime and cast swarms will help you deciding which queen to keep at different times of the season-Yes you can combine and you dont have to wait if you do a news paper combine -one sheet with a small hole punched through between top and bottom boxes -bees being added to the top box of course  8-) RDY-B

[doak]

Once they swarm and are introduced to a new location, they re-orient geographically to their new
location. doak

[malabarchillin]

Forward 10:00 next morning:
I went out this am to make a 5 frame nuc shim to allow a upper escape for use during a hive newspaper combine that can be used often in the future for other things. I then went to combine the captured swarm and a nuc. I opened the captured swarm and it was empty. Either they swarmed again or yesterday I did not get the queen. Late in the day yesterday I rechecked the old swarm location (tree) and there were only a handful of stragglers. Perhaps after I captured most of them yesterday (without the queen ?) they moved to another location ? This am I checked my yard for a swarm, but saw nothing. There is a lot of natural land around me so I hope that they found a home nearby. Note to self: I should have combined when I first caught them. I lost many bees and all the resources that they took with them from a strong hive. Now that hive has a much reduced workforce to gather the fall Brazillian pepper flow that is about to begin.

Thanks for all your replies.
Mike

[rdy-b]

sometimes the swarm instinct is very strong -I have given swarms a frame of honey to hold them only to have them consume most of it and take to the trees again -they have to get it out of there system-woudnt it be funy if they swarmed back to the box they came from :lol: RDY-B

[Brian D. Bray]

sometimes the swarm instinct is very strong -I have given swarms a frame of honey to hold them only to have them consume most of it and take to the trees again -they have to get it out of there system-woudnt it be funy if they swarmed back to the box they came from :lol: RDY-B

To hold a swarm it is much better to use a frame of brood rather than a frame of honey.  Bees will hesitate to abandon brood but they'll take the honey and run.