Hi Richard,
Many beekeepers like myself are in a hurry when they catch swarms.
Allways seems to come at the wrong times and is a crisis for the people
whos yard they are in. Once you get the queen in the box,hive or
whatever the others SHOULD join the queen shortly. The big soft ball
know doubt had the queen so job was basicly over. If she wasn't in the
big ball the bees would have returned to the tree. Waiting for the swarm
to cluster is best but, with the queen in your swarm box ,the bees on
the ladder will join her in short order.  I have on small swarms found
the queen and removed her by herself to the box to the delight of the
kids watching and watched the entire swarm go to the box.
I handle queens all the time so I would recommend you not catching queen
by wings in fingers till you get a few years of beekeeping behind you.
happy beekeeping!
Bob Harrison
 Should I have waited for them to make a big cluster?  None were bigger
than a
> big soft ballwhen I removed them and the air and ground and my ladder and me
> were covered with bees.