4/20 Smoke Bees Erryday

4/20, a day when we can all get together and smoke some bees.

Or catch them.

Today, while inspecting hives in the Brooklyn Navy Yard with a small group of apprentices, I received a text from Meg Paska, The Brooklyn Homesteader.

"A friends bees swarmed in Carroll Gardens. Want free bees?"

The answer is yes.

Yes, I would like free bees.

Thank you kindly.

Catching a swarm is one of the coolest things you can do as a beekeeper. The bees themselves tend to be healthy, as swarms cast from hives that were strong and resilient enough to survive the winter.  They're docile as well; without a hive or brood to defend, they have no reason to sting unless seriously mishandled. That said, it's usually a good idea to wear basic protective gear like a veil. When knocking bees out of a tree, it is surprisingly easy to drop them in your face, and having a bee crawl up your nose is an experience I urge you not to try.

There are other risks as well. Swarms often enjoy alighting in hard to reach places. Up trees, on top of lamp posts, in chimneys, etc. Always remember to be safe and respect the limits of your abilities and equipment. Free bees are great, but they aren't worth hurting yourself. There are many people and beekeeping clubs (including me and the Backwards Beekeepers of NYC) who are happy to help catch swarms and give them a good home. Ask for help if you need it.

Back to the story.

I had an appointment in Red Hook to inspect the hives at the Added Value Community Farm and knew that there was a lot of extra equipment to hive a fresh swarm in, but by the time I was finished with my inspections, it was almost 3 and I figured that someone else would have collected the swarm.

I mean, free bees, right? Irresistible.

Still, I figured I was due for some good luck. Accompanied by one of the Brooklyn Grange Beekeeping Apprentices who was free for the afternoon, I threw some boxes (tupperware!?) into my car and booked it to Carroll Gardens.

I dropped Allison, the apprentice, off at the corner with instructions to find the house with the swarm while I went around the block trying to find a place to park. If someone had already laid claim to the swarm, I could just swing back around and she could jump right back in. No fuss, no muss. When I found parking, which happened to be extremely easy, I found Allison standing out in front of a bright pink flowering ornamental cherry tree. Up at the top was a remarkably large swarm, hanging from a thick branch and buzzing contentedly.

Hello, ladies.

After I finagled a ladder from a friendly neighbor, I set it up under the swarm, being very careful not to stomp on the flowers underneath. I sprayed the bees with sugar syrup to get them full, heavy, and calm while I maneuvered the large plastic tub I had brought into place under the swarm.

Would you care for a snack?

*BAM*

I quickly jerked the large branch the cluster was hanging on, the entire mass of bees fell into the box with a thud, and I slipped on the lid.

Swarm captured.

Bam them bees into the bucket.  Don't smash them!  A quick, firm tap will do.

Closed up and super excited.

The action sent a cloud of confused worker bees flying, so I waited several minutes for them to land on the branch again and shook them into a small cardboard box, which I quickly emptied into the main tub of bees. I did that a couple times and ended up only leaving a handful of bees behind hanging out on the branch. They should find their way back to their original hive over the next day or two with no problem, as long as I got the queen.

Catching the stragglers and showing off my worn out bee pants.

Get in my swarm box, or I will point at you with strong intent.

With the bees in tow, I gingerly placed them in the back of my car, returned the borrowed ladder and headed back to Red Hook where I had set up a deep hive body full of drawn frames to accept the new bees.

Looks like plenty of room.  For a package, this would be huge.

Once I arrived, I opened up the hive and started pouring. So many bees.

Uh...
Slightly bigger than a three pound package.

Quite a bit bigger, in fact.

After they were all out of the tub, I did my best to close the hive without squashing too many and started transferring any large masses of bees hanging on the outside of the hive to the entrance at the front.

A small gob of bees.  Warm and fuzzy.

I'm covered in bees.

When I left them, they were marching in and spraying Nasonov with their butts up on the air. Good signs.

Allison, looking triumphant with a buttload of bees.  That's a technical term.

Welcome home!

This is probably the biggest swarm I have ever caught and it barely fit into a 10 frame deep. I'm going to have to go back soon and give them extra room to expand into. If their queen is good and starts laying, they're going to grow, and they're going to do it fast.

Awesome.

A Tale of Four Swarms

A special guest post by Robert O'Neal, my dad and fellow beekeeper in Ohio.

I. FIRST SWARM

I received a call from mom that there was a swarm in a tree above Baba and Dido’s [my grandparents] house. I asked how high up and she said maybe 15 feet. I couldn’t get home for a couple of hours so we really didn’t get there until after 6:00. We drove over to the house and the swarm was indeed in a tree but 30 feet high.

Big swarm, tall tree.

Luckily it was in a scrub cedar a couple of feet from other scrub cedars on each side. We got Mr. Ritchie [our neighbor] to come over and formulated a plan to cut the tree and lower it by utilizing a pulley and rope attached to the pickup.

Mr. Ritchie and my Dad scheme to get the bees out of the trees.

This worked out great at first. Mr. Ritchie cut a wedge in the trunk and as we lowered it down, it moved steadily in an arc until ….the remaining trunk broke and the bottom slid 10 feet along the ground sweeping the top of the tree in a down and inward arc that stopped when it landed on a juniper, throwing most of the bees all over the bush. Undaunted, we went inside and had Martinis.



By the time the Martinis were done, the bees had gathered again, for the most part, and with Ritchie’s help we cut enough juniper branches to reach them, gathered as many as we could into the nuc box and left it on the ground next to the bush. It was getting dark at that point and I determined I had better leave it open for the next day not knowing how many bees we gathered and how many remained.



I went back the next morning and it looked like normal hive activity with bees flying in and out. That evening we transferred the nuc box to our house where I set up a hive transferred the frames, dumped as many bees as I could into the hive body, closed it up, and then left the nuc box open to clean out on its own. I checked the hive on May 21st and found that it had a comb, honey and eggs. After a quick inspection, I closed it up and left it alone to do what bees do best.

Dumping bees out of the nuc and into their new hive.

Home Sweet Home.

II. SECOND SWARM

A call from home: another swarm. This one was in the front pasture next to the barn.

Bees errywhere.

What to do? I told mom to get the nuc box and put frames stored in the barn into it and get it ready. Then the bees got into the barn and started investigating the hive bodies that were in there.

Trying to get in the barn where we store our extra hive bodies and frames.

She took frames and set them next to the foundation of the barn and the bees started to collect on those. By the time I got home she had lifted the frames up and put them in a hive body.

Rockin' out.

It looked like they were all going in and out of the hive and I just let it go until dark, when I closed it up and we brought it over to Baba and Dido’s house. My policy is that if we find a swarm at their house, I bring it to our house, and vice versa.

This one worked well and now mom considers it her hive. That hive has comb, honey and eggs in it and seems to be doing well on inspection on the 21st.


III. THIRD SWARM

I was done inspecting for the day so I went back to the garden and was walking toward the barn when I caught sight of a swarm on the “magic” post. This is a wooden fence post with a small grape vine growing near it that has now attracted four swarms over the past three years- two last year that I caught and one the year before that didn’t work out.

Bees love the magic stick.

I’m basically out of hive bodies so I talked to a friend bee keeper who was down to one hive and told him if I found another one I would give him a call. I had some frames left, so I put them in the nuc box and collected the swarm. I left it on the ground so the bees would hopefully collect in it. Oddly, there were several bees at least that were pretty aggressive and kept bouncing off my veil. I was pretty careful not to stir them up too much and I thought this was a little odd. Then they began collecting on the front of the nuc box.

Bearding the nuc.

The bee keeper friend couldn’t get over until the evening and when he got there, there were many on the front and sides of the box. I suggested we wait until morning to see if they went back in and if they did I would close it up. They didn’t. They were still on the front and sides. I thought they might be too hot so I moved them into the shade and again there were some aggressive bees that kept bouncing off the veil. I looked inside and they didn’t seem to be making any comb. This was Sunday and they appeared agitated.

The bees abandoned the nuc for a while and regathered on a nearby fence post.

Time for your close up!

I set them up on a box with the front of the nuc hanging over so they couldn’t collect on the ground. They did beard some but seemed to be less than when they were out in the sun. They stayed agitated for hours. In fact, I got stung a couple of hours later in the garden 40-50 feet away. It was a bee that kept buzzing around and looking for me and wasn’t going to give up. The bee keeper friend came over that evening, put on his suit and mom put on a suit to help him. He picked it up and put it in a big brown cardboard box and taped it closed. I heard he installed it with good success and we will see what happens.


IV. FOURTH SWARM

Argh! The next day, Baba called in the afternoon to tell us there was a swarm on the apple tree in front of their bedroom window.

Bees and apples, friends forever.

I didn’t have any more frames. I called the ex-bee inspector and he gave me the name of somebody in the bee club who lives near us. I finally got in contact with him and asked if he wanted the swarm. He came over with his grandson and a cardboard box with a green plastic garbage bag. Sure enough they were on the granny smith tree all bunched and happy. First, he sprayed the swarm with sugar water using a hand held sprayer, then he scooped what he could into the bag, and then holding the bag he shook the tree and the bees went wild.

I don’t think the stings bothered him too much but he definitely got a few. He then sprayed the inside of the cardboard box with sugar water and let it sit for a while to gather the remaining bees. He tied off the bag and put it in his truck. The bees left gathered in the box and after a while he took what he could and left.


WRAP UP

In checking all the hives on the 21st, I found that two hives [the original hives] had no eggs but good population and queen cells and my feeling is at least two of the swarms came from them.

The Carniolan mix that I got as a swarm last year was chock full of bees a few weeks ago, but now has a lesser population. If I can get to them later in the week and they still don’t have eggs I am going to have to order a queen to try to save them.