Last night my son came running in and said "There's a HUGE swarm in the scrub oak!" We are just starting into swarm season, up here, and this is the earliest I've ever seen. It was just before sunset, so I jumped on the opportunity to get them settled in for the night.
Sure enough - my best guess is around 8-10lbs, hanging low in the scrub - about 3-5' off the ground. I piled up some empty supers & leveled them. It was getting cool and the light was fading by the time I got them set up. 'Nudged a medium with 5 frames of comb, from my sole winter dead out, up under the bottom of the swarm and they immediately started in. By morning they were settled in and I moved them right over to the spot that dead out had been.
There were so many bees that they were overflowing the 5 comb/five empty frames. I gave them another medium with 3 comb/7 empty, and they were all over half of it within 15 minutes.
Now the question is - which hive did they come from ( if any)? They were just ~10-15' from my end hive - awfully suspicious. All of the original colonies still look quite the same - no one obviously just gave up ~2/3 of it's force. All but one have a large foraging force, and that one has been lagging just a bit behind the others all spring (kind of normal).
I guess it's time to go queen cell hunting/checking...
Topic: Prime Swarm! (Read 2129 times)