2014 swarms

[oliver]

first one here yesterday, cent il, easy catch..

[Variable]

Caught a swarm last night (6/4/14 in Kent WA). Was hanging about 6 feed off the ground in a small maple tree. Sprayed the bees with sugar water. Placed a box on the ground below the cluster and cut the branch from the tree. Shook the bees from the branch into the box and waited for those in the air to calm down. Within about 30 minutes there were only a few bees left in the air and those in the box where fanning. Closed and taped the lid, cut a few slots in the box to keep them ventilated and drove them home. When I got home it was already dark as it was now about 9:45PM. I setup a hive body and frames that were going to be put on my other hives this weekend. I was not prepared to get a new hive and had to come up with a makeshift bottom board. As it was dark I did not think it would be wise to shake the box of bees into the hive so I taped a chunk on old political sign to the top leaving space at the end for the bees to go down into the hive body, cut a hole in the side of the box the bees are in and turned it onto its side (hole down) onto the top of the hive. Taped the box down to the top of the hive body and put a board on top to keep the morning dew off the cardboard and help hold it down in case it got windy last night. I am hoping they will still be in my hive when I get home tonight... I guess they could leave if they want.... I am expecting to get home and find them in the hive and not in the box on top. I will remove the box, place a feeder and put the top on. Hope they make it! First swarm removal for me. What a joy!!

You can see a few pics of the swarm and retrieval at:
https://www.facebook.com/twolittleladiesapiary
Sorry there are not more, I was not able to take pics while working...
Thanks and I hope you enjoy this.

[KD4MOJ]

Two swarm calls while here at work... hope they are there when I leave the office!

...DOUG
KD4MOJ

[Edgy]

Driving home from logging camp this afternoon I recovered a wild swarm on a tree along the logging road.  All I had for a box was a grease cartridge box. I tossed out the grease tubes and shook them in.  Then drove another hour and a half to get home and place them in a hive box.  So far so good!

[gardeningfireman]

Got a swarm about 7 or 8 pounds eight feet up a maple tree. Divided it in two deeps because I happened to have an extra queen. She came from a swarm that absconded a couple days earlier. When I brought that swarm home in a swarm trap, she wasn't even inside. I went back after the swarm absconded to re-hang the trap and there she was on the side of the tree! Talk about dumb luck!
On 6/6, I had a large swarm move into my greenhouse/bee-equipment storage building!

[Edgy]

Caught another one yesterday, three times as big as the first one. 

[BeeMaster2]

I hived 2 swarms this weekend at the farm. One covered 3 medium frames with another frame of brood hanging below 2 frames. The other one was in a 6 frame deep with large beards out front. It filled up a 10 frame medium even though I did not save any of the hanging drone comb. I had to add a super above it. They still were bearding out front the next day.
Looks like another 6 frame nuc has bees in it. Could bee lost bees but it did pretty active.
Jim

[KD4MOJ]

Two swarm calls while here at work... hope they are there when I leave the office!

...DOUG
KD4MOJ

An update....  suckers took off 5 minutes before I arrived!!! ARGH!

...DOUG
KD4MOJ

[Diogenes]

As luck would have it, I was going to move the swarm trap on top of some fencing so that I could put the fence up.... Fortunately/unfortunately a small swarm had occupied that rather ratty deep. Looks like there will be a delay until I can move them for a bit.

And I was afraid the feral bees had been nuked by the vicious winter....

8-)

[BeeMaster2]

Two swarm calls while here at work... hope they are there when I leave the office!

...DOUG
KD4MOJ

An update....  suckers took off 5 minutes before I arrived!!! ARGH!

...DOUG
KD4MOJ

That's rough Doug.
I drove 45 minutes searched around and found a huge swarm in a tree. The top of the swarm was 10 feet off the ground but the bottom was at eye level. Walked back to my truck 10 feet away and heard the swarm take off. My wife asked me what to do. I told her, watch it.  :-D
It was really neat. I was able to walk with the swarm right in the middle of it for about a mile.
I was surprised to see bees flying at me with thousands of bees above flying with me. Later I realized the scouts fly faster above the swarm then they drop below the swarm and fly to the back and fly above and faster than the swarm. The swarm follows the bees above them and ignore the ones below.
If you ever get the chance, try it, it's neat.

[Carol]

My swarm of May 3.14 is still in my top bar hive.....and I have a swarm in my Squirrel box. Dont know how long it has been there....got home yesterday and there it was.   been gone since May 5th.

[calrow99]

Hi to all....  I had a big swarm move-in to my nuc box that I store on the side yard - happens once or twice a year.....   

[GSF]

Clanton, Alabama. Swarm on side of someone's house. I opened the email from our beekeeper's association about 7 hours too late. Clanton's about 14.5 miles north of here. (Chilton County)

[jayj200]

Just cought 2 swarms this morning
hope they dont turn mean like the last swarm i cought

[BeeMaster2]

I had a small swarm in a trap that was there between 1 to 3 weeks. Not sure when they moved in. Took 2 weeks before I saw them bringing in pollen. I checked it last night and they were gone. I will try to take time betweening extracting honey tonight to open it up and see what is in there.
Jim

[divemaster1963]

Stopped by my second yard after work yesterday and found two swarms in two Apple trees. One about 4 lds. And one about 1.5 . shook them into a bucket and a small box . brought them home and installed them into two nucs I had. Made about 20 nucs to do a mid summer spit on several of my bigger hives .guess I need to build some more. :)

John

[BeeMaster2]

I had a small swarm in a trap that was there between 1 to 3 weeks. Not sure when they moved in. Took 2 weeks before I saw them bringing in pollen. I checked it last night and they were gone. I will try to take time betweening extracting honey tonight to open it up and see what is in there.
Jim

Update.
Opened this swarm trap last night. Found one newly hatched bee and thousands of small SHB larvae in the 3 new pieces of comb and a little bit of SHB larvae in the drawn frame that I put in this trap.
Good news, I opened the other swarm trap in my yard and it is packed with bees and drawn comb. A few weeks ago I opened this hive and found a handful of bees and a marked queen. I closed it up and was waiting to see if that tiny hive could survive.
I strongly suspect that my OH that absconded, took over this hive. I plan on putting it back in the OH. I will be looking to see if the queen is marked.
Jim

[Paul Pelly]

Hi folks. I'm in S. W. Nova Scotia, Canada. I was called to a swarm yesterday and found it 19 feet in the air on a maple. Sharp slope below but managed to place my one ton truck and a 12 foot step ladder under, big plastic garbage can on top step and shake MOST of the swarm into the can, climb down, dump bees into my first TBH. Watching the remaining bees on the branch and the hive, bees re-clustering on the branch and exiting TBH.  Up I go again and managed to shake the queen off on second try. Wrapped the TBH up good after dark and back to my place. I've only been keeping bees for 3 yrs. now and am very happy/excited about how well it works when planed out carefully. I am also currently running a trap-out at my mom's house and am really doing well there. Thanks to you generous contributors here on this form  I am learning good methods to handle these kind of situations. Thank you all for sharing your knowledge and enthusiasm.   The honey is fantastic! No crops near so all marsh land and woods. This IS a dream come true. Thanks again.  Paul

[richter1978]

Night before last I moved two hives from my backyard to an outyard about a mile away.  Yesterday morning I noticed a few foragers hovering around so I put two empty hives in place.  When I got home from work one of the hives had a cluster a little bigger than a softball on the side. Thought a bunch had returned.  Went to paw them into the box and noticed a big fat queen amongst them. I caged her and gave them some brood and honey.  Went through the two moved hives and both have their queens.  Swarm #5.

[BeeMaster2]

2 weeks ago I moved my hives back to my house in town. Had one empty hive on the ground that just had 4 drawn frames in the bottom super and 1 drawn frame in the top super, all of which were flopped sideways a little. I had used this hive as a table to move a swarm out of a swarm trap that was above this location, into my observation hive that following Friday. We went on vacation and when we returned my wife told me that there were a lot of bees coming and going from it.
I tried to open it last night when I realized that a dark area under the screen top board was the bees on comb attached to screen. I had to slide the STB a little to the side and cut the comb off the 2 side walls of the corner. One large section of comb dropped into the bottom. I set a PVC chair on its side and used it to bee able to hang the STB so that I could cut out the comb under the screen and put it into a hive. Ended up with 4 frames of new, very soft comb and I put the other drawn combs that they were starting to use in the hive and put it back in the original location.
Because I have so many hives in this yard, i will have to move it slowly to its new location.
Jim