My Carniolan bee hive was started from a package in late spring. It has 2 hive bodies and three supers and a tank feeder on top. Saturday I looked out the back door and found the bees milling around in the air above the hive. Not spiraling up above the house and bee-lining away towards whatever flowers they were feeding on. I left to drop my laundry off and came back 15 minutes later. Looked in the back yard and the bee milling was much reduced: just a few bees flying about. Sixty feet up in the Silver Maple in the back yard was a a dark mass that looked like a giant brown slug stretched along a slim limb so high that I wasn't about to climb up there and confirm that it was the bees. I assumed the bees had swarmed. I built a makeshift "bait" hive next to the "old" hive. kludged together from what I had on hand: two supers and two empty nucs. I emptied one of the supers and put the frames, five each, sprayed with sugar water, into the two nucs. Of course the super frames only went down into the nucs about half way, but I didn't have any full size frames so I figured they were better then nothing. I used the empty super as a makeshift hive stand, putting a board on top of it, then putting the two nucs side by side on top of it. I put the remaining super on top of the two nucs and then put a sheet of newspaper on top of the frames followed by the two narrow tops left over from the nucs that were lower down. I realize this was probably not the ideal way to set up a bait hive, but I was trying to make do with the materials at hand. I had many chores to do that afternoon to get ready for the NYC Century bike ride so I left to take care of them. When I came home after dark the bees were back in the hive, judging from the mass of bees hanging out on the front face of the "old" hive. The next day my bike was stolen of the front sidewalk when I went back inside to turn of the lights on Sunday morning at 5 AM after I had finished loading it up with drinks, food, ATM cards, cash, tools etc. so I spent the day dealing with police & banks etc instead of going on the ride which I had been training for months. Consequently I was home to see the bees do the same drill as on Saturday: run away to their favorite tree limb and come back to the hive at night. Tomorrow is Monday and I should go to work but I may take a "mental health day" to deal with the insurance company, get a new ATM card, and start the work on getting a replacement SS card and drivers license. Any comments or suggestions about the bee-havior of the honeys? Dennis-aka Paul D. Law :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: -- Visit www.honeybeeworld.com/BEE-L for rules, FAQ and other info --- ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::