Honeybee Swarm Caught in a Swarm Trap - May 17, 2021 - Gentle Bees

[@BrooklandsHoneyBees]

Great job! Hope you and your bees are well :)

[@neilh9442]

The Army of pollinators are fascinating. Narration is excellent. Subscribed. You keystone fellas got a nice hustle pimping arthropods for sweet nectar. 👍

[@HiddenSpringApiaries]

Thanks for the sub.

[@MrKagemitsu]

I need to learn how to make these. My girlfriend is a novice beekeeper and lately she's been struggling a lot with swarms leaving their houses and just running off. Sometimes she can recover them, but most of the times she can't. It's very discouraging when that happens. 👀

[@HiddenSpringApiaries]

Well do I have the videos for you then! Our entire trapping process: kzbin.info/www/bejne/ZqnOhoqvnd9kf6M How to make a trap like ours: kzbin.info/www/bejne/d5fbd2loqLebjsU

[@davidpook5778]

Squirrels tried to open the hole for a new home.

[@HiddenSpringApiaries]

Good guess. Actually that was damage caused by a hole saw when we increased the entrance size from a 1" diameter hole to a 1.5" diameter hole.

[@rodneymiddleton9624]

Do you have any idea where they are coming from? I have one trap that has caught it's second already! Thanks!!!

[@HiddenSpringApiaries]

This one came a different direction than the last one. I think there's a beekeeper near here that's not paying attention this year and losing lots of swarms possibly. Then again the bees look like natural cell size bees so could be a tree too.

[@rodneymiddleton9624]

@@HiddenSpringApiaries I have a beekeeper near one of my traps that I'm sure they were his bees. His apiary looks terrible. I feel sort of bad for the girls.

[@HiddenSpringApiaries]

What did Ian's video say today - "swarming is our whip" - well it whips some beeks for sure

[@rodneymiddleton9624]

@@HiddenSpringApiaries It will definitely keep you on your toes. Prevention is best!

[@catchandinstallhoneybees.1901]

wow amazing

[@HiddenSpringApiaries]

Thanks!

[@happydan20]

Can I ask what you do with all these bees you capture, I know you move them, but why? Is it a way to have more hives to make honey/money? Removing them from areas people don't want them?

[@HiddenSpringApiaries]

Mostly it's to increase the number of hives we have, and right behind that it's to bring genetics from the area into our bloodlines. The bees from the area are the ones that are best adapted to our area. Swarms around here don't have enough time to produce a honey crop their first year.

[@happydan20]

@@HiddenSpringApiaries Thank you for answering, if I may ask another question. If you have a ton of bees on an apiary, how do you ensure they have enough food, that there are enough flowers around to support the concentration of bees? Do you supplement food at some point?

[@HiddenSpringApiaries]

Sure thing, fire away. For most beekeepers, keeping so many bees at one spot that supplemental feeding is needed would be counter-productive (we want to make honey, not spend money on sugar). How many hives you can keep at one spot comfortably really depends on your area, some places have little forage around and can only support a handful of hives, other places (like where we are located) are full of organic farms and field edges to the point where it likely would be hard to overpopulate an apiary.

[@michaelfike7542]

I'm working on my 14th swarm this year and I have bee's checking out my boxes again. I love watching a swarm move in a box 📦. 🐝❤

[@HiddenSpringApiaries]

14 is great - how many traps do you have out and what's your area?

[@michaelfike7542]

@@HiddenSpringApiaries North west ALABAMA i have 8 out now

[@HiddenSpringApiaries]

Cool. You get a bit of a jump start on the swarm season compared to here (south central PA)

[@michaelfike7542]

@@HiddenSpringApiaries i used swarm commander but only 1 drop on the outside of the box below the entrance. Sprayed the inside top as recommended and they clustered under the box and would not go in so i did the 1 drop and no problems.

[@HiddenSpringApiaries]

We have them cluster under the box occasionally as well - we're working on an adjustment to the trap design to help prevent this.