Things I learned (the hard way) about capturing a swarm of bees.

I thought I had it all figured out, I didn't have another top bar hive so thought I would just install them into the swarm hive that Sue, Rosanne and I made for Sue. It was half the size of the hives for Rosanne and I to install our package bees in and for them to live happily ever after.

It was pretty plain Jane, just a box with entrance holes on each end, top bars for building comb and a piece of plywood over the top. Since Sue had a swarm at her house once, we hoped another might find this tasteful residence and move it but they never did so Sue sent it home with me to use. Swarm boxes work best if you can anchor them in trees and we made this little puppy so heavy, that wasn't an option! So it sat in my garden shed.

Morris had to get in on the photo session, bless his little heart, we miss him. 

This is the big sister to the little hive above and it seems that the bees are happy in their homes.

When I put the ad out on Craigslist, I didn't have an empty hive but thought I'd deal with that if I ever got a call. Much to my surprise I did get a call but thought I had it covered with the swarm hive. Simply install them in that hive, give them some bars of drawn comb out of the other hive and build a permanent home for them at my leisure.

Sounds simple, doesn't it?

It wasn't.

When I built these hives, I used a plan I printed off the internet, I really never thought I would be building another one so didn't save those plans. Everyone has they own idea on how to build a hive and I wasn't thinking straight. I needed to build this new one exactly (or a reasonable facsimile, you would have to see my building skills) so the top bars with comb that I put in the swarm hive, would fit in the new hive. 

The smart thing to have done would be to go to the pond and take some basic measurements of the old hives to use - but then I've never been accused of being smart. I kind of flew by the seat of my pants, I knew I'd made an error on the top measurements when I tried to fit a top bar from one of the other hives in the new hive and it was too big, only about 1/2" but that counts. I just didn't realize  that was going to come back to bite me.

After slaving away for a week, taking apart, scrapping parts of it, agonizing how to make it all fit together, I finally finished it Sat night. Bruce was busy in the field, dealing with his own problems so I called my neighbor's, Tim and Jalene, they came, helped me move it to the pond and level it. My plan was to move the bees early Sunday morning before they were awake. Late Sat night, I put a blanket in the back of the gator and awkwardly, it was heavy, lifted the hive on to the blanket.

Early Sunday morning I tiptoed out to the bees, wrapped the blanket around the hive, I didn't think to plug the entrance holes, duh! I set a cement block on top of the blanket wrapped hive, had to convince the dogs that they were not going, which isn't easy, and set out. I hit a small bump and the hive fell over on it's side!! 

AAUUGGGHHHH!!!

The top bars fell off and bees came swarming out, I hurriedly prop it upright and wrapped the blanket around it again, then headed for the pond. I figured any bees would follow us, after all, they followed the pickup from Sioux City.

My plan was to move the top bars, now loaded with honey, into the new hive and shake the rest of the bees out. Despite my corrections, the top bars were just a little too long for this hive but no problem. I'd brought the reciprocating saw and planned to knock off the excess.

Bad idea, with the first vibration of the saw, the heavy honey filled comb fell off the top bar!

AAUUGGGHHHH!!!

I did have my rescue kit just for this predicament, women's plastic hair clip to clamp onto the honeycomb and zip ties to fasten them to the correct topbars. I had to do this with each one, luckily I had enough. (The bees will reattach the comb to the topbars and late I will cut out the clips and they will repair that spot. Bees are quite ingenious.)

After shaking the bees into the hive, I left the swarm hive on it's side to encourage the rest of the bees to pack their bags and make the move into their new home and left for the day. That night I went back for the hive and found some bees stubbornly hanging out in the swarm hive so I shook them out and hoped they had the good sense to follow the others into the hive. 

Back home I took the hive outback and found a bunch of bees clustered around the cement blocks it sat on, dang it! So I set the hive back up on the blocks and they immediately started the trek up the blocks and into the hive. I gave them a day to settle back in, last night I plugged the entrance holes with wine corks and this morning loaded it into the gator for the trip to the pond. I had to discourage the dogs, they just don't understand the gator leaving and they aren't in the back.

I laid the hive on it's side on a table across from their permanent home, it's chilly so they aren't moving much but it's supposed to be in the 80's today and sunny.

A few bees flew out of the hive to see what was going on so I left because I didn't have my bee suit on.

On the way home, I searched the ditch where I came upon a pheasant nest while asparagus hunting....

....and there she was! It's a big deal because our pheasant numbers have been down the last few year, we would go all summer and not see any young pheasants.

And you can see why the females are so drab, to blend in with the grasses. The rooster pheasant may be flamboyant and noisy but count on the hen to do all the work of raising a family.

You go girl!