Catching a bee swarm

It's been a busy couple of days around here. We have a black snake that has made itself at home around here. On Friday I found it in the hen house with an egg in its mouth. It let go of the egg when I grabbed it by the tail and took it to the far end of the property. I like black snakes for the most part, they take care of any rodent problems and generally don't bother much. But if I find it back in the hen house, I'll make short work of it.

 Then this afternoon I found it out in the garden. If you look closely you'll see there are two black pipes there in the photo, one is actually the black snake. It looked like it was trying to molt so I just let it be. When I came back out in the early evening it was still in the exact same spot and I found that odd. So, I decided to take a closer look. It turns out the snake had managed to get tangled up in the deer netting as was quite stuck! I got out my pocket knife and cut it free (without so much as a thank you!).

But on to the more exciting stuff. On Friday evening we had a swarm of bees in the side yard…..again!. This is the second time in two years bees have shown up in the exact same spot.

It really is an amazing, and I imagine for those not familiar with bees frightening, experience to see a swarm of bees. It seems as if the sky is full of them. They are everywhere and make an almost cyclone like pattern flying in circles. 

 As you can see from the picture they settled on my electric meter. The last time they swarmed there, they were able to get behind the meter and into the space between my basement ceiling and the family room floor. I sealed up around the meter box with clear caulk so they could not get in this time. It was only two weeks ago that I had finally gotten around to fixing the holes I made in the wall/ceiling to get them out.

 I thought I'd try to capture this swarm and get a working hive from it.  I went out back and set up a hive box with some empty frames and a couple with some honey in them. I closed off the entrance to the hive as I didn't want them to get out for at least 24 hours. 

I got my bee suit on and went downstairs and mixed up a batch of sugar water and put it in a hose end sprayer. I sprayed the swarm with this (it prevents them from flying) and scraped them into an empty drywall bucket. I then took the bucket out to the hive box and dumped them in and quickly closed them up. I opened the entrance the next evening and I've been feeding them with a mixture of 1:1 sugar water. This weekend I'll open it up and see if I got the queen with the swarm and if she is laying fresh brood. If not, I may have to buy a queen for them.