Guy called me up and said he was cleaning his bird boxes in the fall, asked if I would come get them.
They had the box just about full of comb so had been there for a while. I was told to just take the house so I did.
Got them home and into a deep hive body. They surprised me and built up so they made it thru the winter.
These were on a corn picker elevator. Guy had been in his shop working on some thing and heard them come in and land. They were in 3 spots two of which you can see. The ones down in the elevator I inticed up with frames of drawn comb.
This is from a real long time ago one of my first. I sat the folding work table on top of my truck cap then the bottom board and hive. Used a pruning pole to pull the branch down to the hive. Took them about a half hour to march in.
Do stuff a lot quicker today with the bee vac.
This one was so easy and simple but took a long time to leave the area. They were in front of the local Home Depot store in one of the flowering crabs. Set the hive body under them shook them in and closed them up. Had probably all the workers from the store standing watching me in a T shirt and ball cap and watching me do the deed. Then I got the 40,000 questions of where they came from, why did they come and why did they pick that spot on and on for a long time. Five years latter I got another call from Atlanta to ask if I would go there and get another swarm from the garden center. I did.
This is one I consider the best of all. Lady called me in the late evening near dark and asked if I would come get them. I told her it was late and the weather forecast was calling for some bad thunder storms and wind during the night. I asked if she would call me back in the morning if they were still there.
In the morning she called and said they were still there. It was about a two hour drive but I feel well worth it. I put t5he hive down next to them started looking for the queen, found her installed her in the queen catcher in the hive. The bees marched right in. The lady was amazed they would do that. She then had to show me her front yard on Lake Huron.
Al
