Cleo Hogan on trapouts

[Lburou]

Cleo Hogan has tuned taking bees from trees to a science.  His pdf is attached below.  The idea is simple, the execution can get complicated by terrain, height, and property owner's druthers.

I did a trap out in a mature pecan tree last year using his method.  The bees were aggressive and the property owner needed them gone -people getting stung while mowing.  I put a swarm box on a stand next to the tree, reduced the entrance and used a one inch inside diameter pvc pipe for their new entrance.  After a day or two for the bees to adjust to the new entrance, I put the pvc pipe into the end of a swarm box containing one or two frames of drawn comb and rite cell foundation to fill the box.

I left it that way for about two days, then placed a small cone over the pipe end inside the box.  This trapped the foragers outside the tree but let them come and go freely to the swarm box.  After the second day, the box was full of bees.  Over a queen excluder, I added a frame of wet brood and an 8 frame box with mostly foundation in the frames and one or two frames of honey and pollen.  In the process, I added queen cells above and below the excluder. (You can see that the swarm box was not a standard size, so an adapter device is shown under the excluder, you can ignore it).



This is how it looked as we left the swarm box and 8 frame super with queen cells.  Both queens hatched and began to lay.



We took a colony out of the top box and hived it in an 8 frame setup, and took it home...Also shown below is our reloading the swarm box with drawn comb and more foundation for the next round of harvested bees after taking the 8 frame deep away full of bees!







By this time, the homeowner's patience was spent and we sealed the tree with cement and wire, took our new bees and equipment, and went home.  A good time was had by all!  At various times, my good friends Chip and Crosby were kind enough to assist in the fun.

P.S.  These pictures show the actual screen cone used above (it's really small).  The cone slides into a coupling which then slides over the end of the PVC pipe they are already habituated to using as an entrance.

[G3farms]

So you did not get the queen out of the tree??

Good pics of what you did thanks!

[Lburou]

The queen was probably still in the tree.  If you could have been there, you would probably think the bees were Africanized to some extent.  They would sting you just getting close.  The homeowner's son was about to visit.  He is allergic and it was important to remove the threat, so we did.  After removing all the comb that I could reach, there weren't many bees left in the tree...Sad to say, we sprayed soapy water, closed the entrance and walked away.  The cement patch looked like bark from ten feet away, was real proud of the repair to the tree.   It was a lot of work, with unpleasant bees for the $125 we asked for.

[neillsayers]

good info, Lee, thanks

[Perry]

I thought the difference between a Hogan trap-out and any other was that it was supposed to lure the queen out? Was that the intent and time and land owner prevented it? Also, why bother adding cells if that was the case? I'm curious.

[brooksbeefarm]

Cleo Hogan gave a presentation at our bee club about 3 years ago on trap outs. i've yet to get the queen with his method, but some other members who tried it did? He gave a good talk and answered question from the members. He works with/or for? Kelly Bee Supply Co. and buying nuc's came up. He said that a five frame nuc box with 3 frames of brood, one frame of honey and pollen, and one empty frame or foundation, and a caged queen is a nuc i disagreed. I supposed you can call it a nuc , but not in my book, if the queen has not been released and the brood in the frames are not hers, then to me you might as well buy a 3 pound package with a caged queen and put three frames of brood in it from your own hives. Other than that i enjoyed his presentation, guess i'm just set in my ways. Jack

[LazyBkpr]

He said that a five frame nuc box with 3 frames of brood, one frame of honey and pollen, and one empty frame or foundation, and a caged queen is a nuc i disagreed.


   I disagree as well. Unless the queen is laying and the brood it hers its nothing more than a package. Riskier getting the queen accepted and no guarantee she will even be a good laying queen. the "reason" you buy a nuc is so you can SEE how well the queen is doing. You can tell if the bees are runny or aggressive, etc...

[Lburou]

I thought the difference between a Hogan trap-out and any other was that it was supposed to lure the queen out? Was that the intent and time and land owner prevented it? Also, why bother adding cells if that was the case? I'm curious.

Perry, this queen is one I would pinch in any case, so nothing lost.  I don't know if she would have come out or not.  Cleo Hogan has written that the queen coming out was about a 50% chance.  The land owner was ready to have her yard back and company was coming, so we ended it with a total of 14 frames of bees.  I was just experimenting with the queen cells in tandem with a trap out.  I sold one NUC and one 8 frame hive  made from these bees and the grafted & hatched & laying queens. 

Jack & Lazy, I would agree that a NUC should have a loose and laying queen.