Milt,
Before someone browsing Bee-L thinks they can use a shop-vac uninhibited by
a screen or box, ANY(!) shop vac will quickly kill every bee you get ahold
of.  Pressure/speed from 1/4hp+ motors will rip legs, arms and simply squish
fragile bees.  Vacuums larger than a dustbuster offer zero hope of obtaining
"live" bees without the help of something to reduce air-pressure once the
bees are sucked into the vacuum hose.

There's a bee-vac on www.beesource.com for free download which I would
highly recommend to people removing bees or catching the occasional swarm
off tree trunks or other spots too difficult to shake.  Building the bee-vac
would normally take a few days.  If you're in a pinch and have a bit of
imagination you could use the air-regulation principle and attach a vacuum
to a couple 5 gallon buckets, one inside the other,  with some sort of hole
for pressure-regulation.

Regards,
Matthew Westall - E-Bees, Castle Rock, CO - USA
-where we just had 8" of snow yesterday to help gaurantee our first spring
flow --

----- Original Message -----
From: "Milt Lathan" <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: [BEE-L] Shop-vac for bee vacuum?
> with another hive elsewhere.  I noticed in the archives, at least one
> person has used a shopvac as a bee-vac.  If I can find a long enough
> extension cord - I may try this next.  Any tips?

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