Hi All
 
In the last year or so I have done just over a hundred bee removals
from established swarms, of which I managed to keep about 20 with
their original queens. (Swarms were much more successful)
 
When a wild swarm is disturbed, the first thing that happens is that
the queen, who is usually in full laying condition and therefore does
not fly easily, runs away somewhere. If she can be disturbed and
caused to swarm when the hive has brood, she is not worth the effort
and should be replaced, because a good queen cannot fly easily.
 
With removals, the best philosophy (IMO) is to look at a wild swarm
as a source of free bees. If they have a good trait, get the queen,
but on the whole wild queens are inferior to reared queens. What I
usually do is to get as many bees as possible and then just place
them very gently in front of a hive that has a good queen at night,
while smoking that hive to bits. The new bees (without queen), who
should have been fed before adding, just run into the hive.
 
If one wants the queen, it is better to actually add her to another
hive that had a laying queen that was no good. This way they are less
likely to swarm/abscond.
 
So to get a swarm of a branch in a tree my advice would be to give it
a bit of smoke, then gently cut the combs of shaking them into a
nearby box. ONce all the combs are of, put the box below the branch
and give the branch a good wack. The bee cluster will fall into the
box, and soon they will orientate on the box. Blow the rest of the
bees of the branch, or keep brushing them with a bee brush. Wiping
some vinegar on the branch also helps mask the queen pheremone on the
branch so that they will not keep going back to that spot (can be a
pain).
 
If you cause too much a fuss, the bees will chew up the queen - only
they know why.
 
Keep well
 
Garth
Garth Cambray           Camdini Apiaries
Grahamstown             Apis mellifera capensis
Eastern Cape Prov.
South Africa
 
Time = Honey
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