Have you ever seen a swarm? I have never but I would like to see one. We have set out traps and this is the first year that we have done traps. My sister got me a trap, I bought a trap, and I built a trap. So that means we have three traps. 

Bees swarm for many reasons there is a common one though. The most common reason is that there are so many bees in a hive that the queen lays another queen and then the queen tells some of the bees to come with her then they land on the spot. The other bees said that this was a good spot.

So there are two common bee traps. One of them is a nuc box with 4 drawn out frames with lemongrass or swarm commander. There is also one that looks like a basket and you do the same thing you just put lemon grass or swarm commander.

When you do catch a swarm, if it’s the one that looks like a nuc box, all you do is take out the frames and put it in the hive that is in your bee yard. But if you catch one with the basket you just shake the bees out into the frames in the box. Once you have it in the hive you should feed it with sugar water when you are treating mites (before you have honey supers on). Also, people have said that the bees that they catch from swarms are the best bees they have had.

This is how we people catch swarms. Hopefully, we catch one this year! This is what a swarm looks like. If you ever see a swarm, call a beekeeper because they would be happy to have free bees. Hopefully you learned something!