[hemichuck]

I just got a swarm call from a guy in a truck stop about 50 miles down the interstate from here who said that he just parked his big rig in the middle of a swarm in the Petro parking lot.When I got there it was up along the top edge of the back of his trailer.I geared up and climbed up on my ladder and took my brush and brushed them into a large cardboard box then I dumped the box into a deep with some drawn comb.I think I got the queen on the first sweep because a lot of bees gravitated towards the box after the first dump.I went back up the ladder and made my second sweep and the bees were pretty agitated by then.They found an opening to my jacket and I started taking some stings to the head and face(I dont know how many but I think 20 would be a real conservative estimate) I dumped 2 boxes in a deep and another in a nuc I had handy.I waited about an hour and a bunch went in the boxes but these bees were still everywhere.I brushed what I could into the entrances and sealed them off.I couldnt get the bees off the outside of the box so I just loaded up both boxes and headed home in full gear with a couple thousand bees still flying around in the van and others just clinging to the outside.I got them home and set them on the hill with the others.I dont know how many I got but the brood box was packed and there were a bunch of bees in the nuc.My head and face are swelled up like I was in a bar fight.If someone will tell me how to post pictures I would be glad to post a couple.
http://i84.photobucket.com/albums/k5/cd3_01/beepictures036.jpg
http://i84.photobucket.com/albums/k5/cd3_01/beepictures044.
http://i84.photobucket.com/albums/k5/cd3_01/beepictures049.jpg

 

[blueline]

I felt your pain a couple of days ago on my first swarm, it too was from H__L
thankfully I didn't have much of a reaction to the stings. I hope you are as fortunate. The good news for me and I hope for you is, that swarm has settled into their new home and seem to be much more gentle then they were when we first met.

Good Luck
Blueline

 

[Bens-Bees]

Wow... any more swelling and your eyes would just disappear completely. That's pretty bad, I wonder why they were so agitated.

 

[Sarepta bees]

I'm glad to see that i am not the only one to get tore up on my first encounter, I bought some used hives and showed up completely unprepared. Not in the face but back and neck were swolled for days. Good luck brother, you've been brought into the pack!

 

[devdog108]

whoa.....Im am sorry...I really am, but that is a GREAT picture and it made me laugh...

 

[beekeeper1756]

Man oh Man. Ouch, you do look like you've been in a bar fight.

The picture of the swarm on the truck was beautiful and alarming all at the same time. I thought swarms settled down but that pic shows lots and lots of bees still flying in the air. I wonder why they were so aggressive?

 

[hemichuck]

My head and face have all gone back to its former size today.The picture was great and very amusing.Thats why I had to post it.My stepdaughter saw me at work the next day and was laughing continuously every time she saw me.I couldnt help but laugh at myself for making such a stupid mistake.The best I can figure is that the swarm had been in the area for a while and the constant traffic through the lot had them fired up.There was also about a 25mph crosswind so I dont think the other bees could fan enough phermones for the straglers to find the box.When I got them home and boxed them up in 2 deeps they all hung outside for a few hours and went in about dark.Next morning I went out and looked in the nuc and all of the bees had gone back to the hive so I removed it and the whole time I was messing with it they never even looked twice at me.Maybe they figured I had enough.Today they are calm as can be.I would love to see the hive that they swarmed from because it had to be huge.I left a couple of thousand bees on the ground and there were probably a thousand in the air and another thousand still on the guys truck an hour later down the interstate.He called and ask me how to get the rest of the bees off his truck so he could make a delivery.

 

[devdog108]

That is amazing. I made the mistake of not zipping my sheriff suit completely closed. It even velcros at the closing and i did it.....ONLY MADE THAT MISTAKE ONCE!!! Congrats...that looks like an awesome hive!

 

[StevenG]

Man, that is an amazing story, and amazing pictures! Your face is the prime example why I always wear a veil, you just never know. Glad you're returning to normal, and the bees have calmed down. You're probably going to enjoy harvesting honey from them!
Regards,
Steven

 

[G3farms]

haha I like that second pic looks like the girls are marching up the yellow brick road to the hive.

They sure did get you good on the face, glad none went for your eyes or up the nose!

G3

 

[hemichuck]

Yeah it was amazing how they congregated on the yellow lines,maybe they were cooler or something.They were clinging on to everything in sight,ladder,boxes,yellow stripes.I took the call at 10:00am and got out there around 11:30.The guy who called was really patient and said he would wait however long it took.By the time I brushed them off and shook them into the box twice,got stung 20 plus times,brushed them off the truck again and had the guy drive off so they wouldnt go back to the truck and finally just sat down in a chair I brought,exhausted,and waited an hour for them to go into the box with 20 or so really PO'd bees circling my head the entire time,it was around 2:30 when I realized that these bees were not going into that box till it was dark and in a truck stop it never gets dark.I just swept what I could up in a dust pan and dumped them into the boxes as best I could.By then I was more concerned with getting home(about a 50 mile trip) before my eyes swelled shut.I stuck them in the truck with bees all over the outside of the box and drove like h**l with all my gear still on.All in all a real hack job but a good learning experience and I gained some nice looking bees.If the suns out tommorow I might crack the lid open and see how much comb they have drawn.As bad as it went,I would have took off after another swarm the same day if somebody had called.