---

   In the spring of the year, honeybees go into full production. As pollen becomes available from flowers and trees, the queen bee starts laying eggs to increase the number of workers available to make honey for the next year. Many times, the number of young produced exceeds the space available in the place where they live. In that case, the queen will slim down so she can fly, lays a few more eggs, and with the majority of the worker bees, forms a swarm and leaves their current home. This swarm of bees forms a cluster where they gather before they leave for their new place of residence. This new location has generally been pre-selected by scout bees that have been sent out looking for new real estate. The sight of this swarm of bees can be rather alarming to someone that does not understand what is happening. The cluster of bees can be a few thousand to tens of thousands depending on how many bees are leaving the old location. The cluster of bees will hang out for anywhere from an hour to a day or two before they move on.

   A co-worker of my son, knowing I had bees, told Damon about a swarm that appeared on his front porch. Though he was apprehensive about his children walking past the bees to leave for school in the morning, he knew they should not be destroyed. Damon called me and I prepared to rescue the swarm.

   From the picture I was sent, it seemed like a simple job. The bees were hanging on the underside of the top handrail of the porch near the front door of the house. A bench ran the full length of the porch making a great place to set the hive. In the SUV, I loaded a hive box with top and bottom, all my bee handling equipment, and some sugar water in case the bees needed a drink. I placed the hive on the bench, filled the feeder with sugar water and donned my gloves and veil. Everything you read says bees in a swarm will not sting a person. I do not believe everything I read, so I used part of my protective equipment just in case. I scooped a couple of handfuls of bees and dropped them into the hive. Most stayed in the hive, but some flew back to the porch railing. I tried to sweep them in with minimal success. Worker bees will stay with their queen if possible and most of the handfuls I had put in the hive were staying there which led me to believe, the queen was in the hive. There was a fairly strong wind blowing so I think the bees remaining on the porch railing could not smell their queen. I left the hive on the bench to let the bees outside of the box calm down and regroup. Later that day, before the children returned from school, my wife and I went back to attempt to catch the bees that did not find their way into the hive. Most of the bees were still in the hive and I got another handful off the railing to add to it. A few bees refused to cooperate, so they were left behind. I thought they would fly off with no queen to keep them in place. My wife was not impressed to be riding with me in an enclosed vehicle with a hive of bees and a couple of strays flying around our heads as we drove back home.

   The next morning, I got a message, the homeowner had placed a small box near the bees that had been left behind. During the night, they all moved into the box, and he closed it in the morning. I added them to the hive that morning. The bee swarm, now complete, seems quite content in their new home.

---