> Property owner wants the tree removed.

Time-scale is important here.  Often people expect you to wave a magic wand and remove everything instantly.  The other factor is accessibility.

If the owner wants it done instantly then it might be best to remove the entire piece of trunk assuming that you have the ability to do that and somewhere to park it all at least 3 miles away.  That would then give you time to sort them out at your leisure.

If not, then there is the potentially difficult task of removing them from the tree.  Not too bad if you can get to the combs.  I had a similar situation some years ago when I was called to a colony in a huge willow tree that was due to be removed the next day(!) as they were clearing the ground for a motorway.  Of course, they would have just bulldozed everything and killed the colony, so my interest was in saving the bees.

It was a wet and stormy day (of course) with few bees flying.  One of the workers took a huge chainsaw and rather bravely sliced away the front of the trunk for me - before beating a hasty retreat.  Fortunately I managed to smoke out most of the bees together with the queen, so after caging her and popping her in a brood box I was able to cut out the combs.  I do not tie combs into frames - never produces decent combs - but I put the queen in a brood box with drawn comb, add an excluder and empty brood box and then prop the wild  (feral?) combs in it.  If there is too much comb then I add another excluder and empty brood box.

The bees usually go in quite quickly and the whole thing can be removed after they finish flying.  Give them 3 weeks for the brood to emerge and the wild comb can then be removed and supers added.

Best wishes

Peter 
52°14'44.44"N, 1°50'35"W

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