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Mixed bag today. Raced a rain storm to grab a swarm this morning that was low to the ground. Checked my hives for the first time this year and they seem to be doing ok.
On the way from my brothers house I saw a swarm in a neighbors tree. I went back for it a little later and it was probably the event some of you have been waiting for...I spread out a tarp under the swarm, cut some limbs from below it. I tossed a weighted rope over the limb and tugged. Yeah...I pulled a rope on a limb with 5lbs of bees directly above my head. About half of they dropped basically how I wanted but far too many went airborne.
So...there I was, in a bee suit and rubber boots, climbing 20' up a pasture scrub tree and hanging on a limb....cutting a 5-6" limb with a folding saw....with bees th at were already mad from shaking them. I got the limb dropped and bees shook off and thought I had most of them in the box....and then I looked up....obviously missed the queen as I noticed the bees boiling out of my box and flying 30' up the tree into a fork I had no chance of shaking them out of.....it was a hot, sweaty, painful...dismal failure.
I atrapped a box into the tree and left to see what would happen.
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