2 Swarms 4/13/20
Posted: Mon Apr 13, 2020 8:08 pm
The swarm I got at Stadiem's house swarmed today. I sprayed some swarm commander at a convenient spot, but the high winds seemed to prevent it working by itself. I started to tang under the rising cloud of bees and it came lower and toward me. I moved by the spot I had sprayed and the bees gathered near it. I put a medium by the bees and scooped a few clumps into the hive. Over time, the others came to it. I will be checking soon to see if the bees stay or not. The hive that swarmed had a marked queen, and for awhile after the swarm, bees were on the front of the original hive fanning in the air as if to call in bees or a queen. At the same time, bees were wrestling at the entrance of the nuc beside this hive, and after the hive and the nuc calmed down, there were about 30 dead bees in front of the nuc.
As I was dealing with this, I did not see the arrival of a second swarm. They did not move into either of my bait hives, but headed into a stack of supers with the nastiest old comb I had been meaning to scrape or wait for wax moths to take care of. The lid on the stack was cracked open because yesterday I saw a queen and about 20 bees on my driveway pad. The queen looked 3/4 dead. I put her on one of the old, nasty frames and let her gang of 20 climb aboard. I put that frame in the stack of supers with the idea of giving this group of bees somewhere to finish out their existence. I don't have a clue about whether the bees that moved in had anything to do with this small group or whether they had scouted before and then just overwhelmed the few occupants. This swarm covers about 2 medium frames.
All in all it was a strange afternoon.
As I was dealing with this, I did not see the arrival of a second swarm. They did not move into either of my bait hives, but headed into a stack of supers with the nastiest old comb I had been meaning to scrape or wait for wax moths to take care of. The lid on the stack was cracked open because yesterday I saw a queen and about 20 bees on my driveway pad. The queen looked 3/4 dead. I put her on one of the old, nasty frames and let her gang of 20 climb aboard. I put that frame in the stack of supers with the idea of giving this group of bees somewhere to finish out their existence. I don't have a clue about whether the bees that moved in had anything to do with this small group or whether they had scouted before and then just overwhelmed the few occupants. This swarm covers about 2 medium frames.
All in all it was a strange afternoon.