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Swarm Traps

1407 Views 4 Replies 4 Participants Last post by  FlowerPlanter
I built four swarm traps from the plans on this forum, should I put one on my bee yard or not. I put one about twenty yards from my hives about a week or so ago. Today I saw a couple of bees flying around the entrance of it. Am I asking for problems with one that close to my hives.
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You can, you will not draw out a swarm from your own hives, but you may get lucky. The smell or your hive will attract scouts. We had one move in last year in our yard. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqTPQS9W8uE
My cousin gets a few every year in his yard that are not from his hives.
I caught a swarm yesterday. They were ina large ball in a bush by my house. I tried to lure them into a swarm trap nearby, but although the scouts would go in and out, the swarm didn't seem interested. Finally, I shook them off the branch into a garbage can. Then I poured the garbage can full of bees into a 5 frame nuke. There were still many bees flying around, so I just left the nuke hive near the bush, hoping the rest would move into the hive. This morning the bees are still in the nuke hive, but there is a small ball of bees (3-4 inch ball) forming back on the same branch. Do you suppose the queen is still on the branch? Will the bees get her to move into the hive with them?
If it is that small I would trim it off and go through it to see if a queen is in there. They may have had multiple queens in the swarm.
>Should I put one on my bee yard or not.
Yes you should have several in different direction and different distances.

>I put one about twenty yards from my hives
A little too close, about 50 yard is the closest I have caught bees. They prefer a location 50 yard to a quarter mile away. But if you have scouts I would leave it.

>Am I asking for problems with one that close to my hives.
no
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