When do you pull in your swarm traps?

[Patrick Scannell]

When do you experienced swarm trappers pull in your swarm traps?
I'm near Albany, NY and understand that "swarm season" here is from 5/15 to 6/15. I put out 10 boxes, and caught 3 swarms so far.
Is it time to put them away for next year, or is it worth leaving them out a little longer? Thanks.

[naturebee]

I pull them in July.
'A swarm in July ain't worth a fly'

[honeyman46408]

The first swarm I got was in Aug.= I put them on drawn comb and feed them and they survived the winter. The last swarm I got last year was in Sept. soo it aint over till its over

[Michael Bush]

I tend to leave them and refresh the lure in the spring. Sometimes you get a fall swarm, but not often. Besides that's two trips. One to get them down and one to put them back up as opposed to just one to refresh the lure and clean out the birdsnests, wasp nests etc.

[naturebee]

Let me explain my view on late swarms to Ed, then Patrick can decide for himself.

I am 'highly selective' on what type bees and genetics I want. I do not feed syrup, coddle or contaminate my bees with any treatments. This path I have chosen for myself as a way to apply selective pressure to promote a fit Pennsylvania adapted bee. The bees I am eagerly after are from feral colonies that come out of winter fit and have the strength and disease resistance needed to throw a healthy strong prime swarm during May or June. A swarm that is capable of surviving on it’s own without coddling, props, or medication.

Occasionally, a swarm from July on will be from that of 'swarmy bees', or wimpy genetics that came out of winter weak and were un able to throw a prime May or June swarm. So I generally refuse swarms from the July date on in order to avoid this. And save myself the time, money and equipment spent on supplementing bees that in my experience generally will not make the grade or collect enough stores to survive winter.

Also some of these late swarms are occasionally due to absconding from some stress or disease such as varroa etc. I have answered late swarm calls from July on and have turned around and left when I saw to condition the bees were in, so I don‘t even take a late swarm call, I don't want the swarmy or disease susceptible genetics in my apiaries.

So in catching these late swarms, the likely hood increases that they are from that of un fit or smarmy bees, and you will end up investing time, money and equipment on a less than desirable strain of bees, that you might end up having to select back out of your genetics. But if you have the time, money and equipment to spend on collecting, coddling and assessing these late swarms. I say go for it!!! But chances are higher that it will be regrettable in swarms after June.
So, in my case, swarm seasons over when I say it’s over. smile.gif

Joe
“Everything works, if you make it work”

[Patrick Scannell]

Thanks for the comments. My swarm boxes are full of frames of 4.9 mm foundation, which is sweet when you catch a swarm, but kind of an investment to leave hanging in the trees.
I think I'll start pulling them in for the year.

[power napper]

Once in a while a late swarm can be a good one, I have only had one good late swarm and it was due to a severe storm, the storm destroyed the tree where the bees resided and a black bear had helped itself to the spoils. I had an empty double deep hive sitting in a field by my garden, my wife was out picking "Silver Queen" sweet corn so i know it was the end of August or first of September. The absconding bees were a tremendous cyclone of noise as we watched them enter the hive.

[peggjam]

There are lots of uses for late swarms, besides genitics. One point to consider is do you want these late "unfit" swarms to take up residence in a place that if they surivied, their genitics would influnce your breeding program? They make great additions to weak hives, you could always requeen. You could do that experiment with wintering nucs, if you lose them, big deal. I try to take all of the swarms, early or late for one of the various reasons stated above. Live or die, your not out much, and it keeps inferior stock from infesting your bee's forage area.

peggjam

[naturebee]

Good point peggjam! As long as your not using up resources needed for your other colonies, I see nothing wrong with trying to winter them.

Although, me personally, and from past experience, I've learned it is "usually" a waste of time and money to try and winter a late swarm.

[Robert Hawkins]

At the risk of hyjacking Mr. Scannell's thread here, He mentioned that his swarm boxes are full of sc foundation. Does everyone else do that of do you plan on dumping them into a deep w/ foundation/comb?

Hawk

[naturebee]

Hawk, Perhaps it would be preferred to use foundation in swarm traps, this would eliminate the wax worm problem, and make it easier to set the frames into a deep w/ foundation/comb. Your captured swarm may then have a weeks head start laying up brood by the time the traps are checked.

[Grant]

Here in Southeast Missouri (Cape Girardeau County) we're pretty much done with swarms around the 4th of July. Then I go around at a leisurely pace and pick up traps through the month, and yes, there's always a few late swarms, but if I fail to coddle them with syrup, they won't make it on their own. We have a tremendous nectar dearth from mid-July through early September.

I use a six-frame nuc box hung on the side of a tree, often with one frame of drawn comb, typically dark. I doubt the dark comb has any real "drawing power" as I also use pheromone lures, but I feel it gives the queen an instant jumpstart on egg laying, though we believe they carry with them a sense of urgency to get comb drawn anyway.

If I leave vacant traps up after July, the wax moths find them. My other frames are mostly plastic though this year I experimented with strips in "foundationless" frames. I prefer to take the traps down rather than leave them exposed to the weather.

Grant

[naturebee]

Hi Grant, Hope you’ve had good luck catching swarms! I’ve had great success this year trapping swarms in the woodlands. All traps that got swarms were above 6 feet. Traps on shed and mobile home roofs were more effective than other spots. Traps made from old hivebodies and old comb were extremely effective. I was also able to entice one flying swarm to land right on a trap by placing the opened bait box with lure on the ground under the flying swarm. I can now refine next years trapping strategy.

[Joseph Clemens]

I leave mine out year-round. These past two years I've captured swarms in December and January. In 2003-2004 they needed some infusion of honey frames from other colonies, but not the winter of 2004-2005, plenty of rain and blooming plants. They were actually captured by moving themselves into decoy hives set out with a few empty combs.

[Grant]

Thanks, naturebee, and yes I had a good year. I'm just back from a vacation to MN and I'll be picking up my traps. I should have also added that I lose one or two each year to vandals and traps are easier to see in the fall when the leaves are off the trees.

Let me also say your swarm lures worked quite well. I had some other lures from other sources to try, as well as my usual annual source which seems to produce the best lures (and if he allows me to release his name, I'll pass it along). Yours worked real well, naturebee!

I also have to take a picture of a very unusual swarm that took up residence on the underside of a swarm trap, as opposed to actually going in the trap. That post will be coming in a week or so when I catch up from vacation.

Grant

[Grant]

Thanks, naturebee, and yes I had a good year. I'm just back from a vacation to MN and I'll be picking up my traps. I should have also added that I lose one or two each year to vandals and traps are easier to see in the fall when the leaves are off the trees.

Let me also say your swarm lures worked quite well. I had some other lures from other sources to try, as well as my usual annual source which seems to produce the best lures (and if he allows me to release his name, I'll pass it along). Yours worked real well, naturebee!

I also have to take a picture of a very unusual swarm that took up residence on the underside of a swarm trap, as opposed to actually going in the trap. That post will be coming in a week or so when I catch up from vacation.

Grant

[Grant]

opps, sorry for the double post.

Grant