Yesterday around 5:30 p.m. there were heavy orientation flights around most of my hives. When I came out around 6:00 p.m., there were bees in the air behind the hives circling higher like a swarm. I did not see bees pouring out of any hive and this was not the size of a primary swarm. Having watched Wally, I began knocking a hammer on a heavy metal stand. The bees gathered under one of my hives in a place I couldn't reach or dislodge them from. Many landed on the ground and immediately began dying. None tried to enter the hive they were under.
I placed an empty box with a few drops of lemon grass oil and the only spare drawn frame (medium-old sugar water honey from freezer) I had near the "cluster" and several entered the box.
This morning there were about 2 dozen bees in the box, but no queen. There was about a tennis ball size pile of dead bees on the ground and only a few bees under the hive they had gathered under originally.
Would this have been a small swarm from that hive that got into pesticide somehow, lost the queen and attempted to return or something else? Thoughts welcome.