First Free Bees in SD - Jovin's Apiary

First swarm of 2024

The Video (above) shows the bees flying in and out of the swarm trap. I left the trap alone for 3 days. I have replaced the broken bungee cord. The picture to the left is hard to see but there are about 3-4 frames of bees. I smoked them while removing the inner cover (reflectix insulation). There was also a cluster under the frames already drawing out small burr comb. I would estimate 8K bees with a beautiful blonde queen. What a great father’s day present from mother nature!!

I removed the frames from the trap and placed 3 of them in the bottom blue box (right) with 2 frames of drawn comb. There was already about 2 frames of nectar and 1 frame with eggs/larvae and pollen. I placed the remaining 2 frames in the top white box with 1 frame drawn comb and 2 frames of foundation. They should have plenty of resources to start their new colony. I laid the trap at the front bottom of the Nucleus colony so the remaining bees can find their new home. I caught this swarm at the IWL wildflower plot. I moved the swarm temporarily to my home apiary to get established. I plan on returning the colony back to McCook Lake later this summer.