Voted Best Swarm Hangout by Bees

Main ball with auxiliary to right shortly after they settled.

Left-behind portion of swarm that probably just went back to hive.

Donor hive after swarming.

Queen in the box. Rest of swarm working its way in.

Ralph and Lynn's back yard has been voted most popular hangout spot for swarms thee times this month. Yes, yet another swarm. This time off Chris' hive for sure. A mid-morning swarm, Ralph called about 1130 to tell me about a swarm in his apple tree, same one as the first swarm we got from his yard, just opposite side of the tree. Turned out this swarm ball (7k - 9k bees) had an auxillary ball a foot away with smaller number of bees. Went across alley to look at Chris hive, and bees are crowding the porch, hanging off it, and on a branch 15 feet away next to the south fence another ball of bees, about 3000. So evidence is good this came from Chris large hive.

By the time i found someone to come take the swarm, talked to Ralph, etc., all the bees had coelesced into the one major ball. Sharon came with a box, bee suit, tape, and we dropped the swarm into the box. After letting it sit an hour to collect as many bees as possible, we taped it up and she took it away.

Seems likely that the swarm got confused and there was the one left-behind group. I'm thinking that ball probably went back to the hive. The main bunch didn't seem to grow all that much. The donor hive seemed back to normal by the time we were finished at 1430.