Bees and Ground Squirrels

This is a swarm in my own backyard, from one of the hives that a ground squirrel attacked! Needless to say the ground squirrel is now in the ground, premanently, and this swarm is in the process of being placed back into its lovely hive.

These are pictures of the swarm close up. They were quite big and impressive on this mesquite tree.

Another close up of the swarm. You can see the bees occupied multiple branches.

Looks like something off of a nature T.V. program

Bee In the Garden

Today, checking out the devil's claw in our garden as it is growing flowers. My wife got startled by one of our bees popping out! She said I don't know who was more scared me or the bee!

Swarm and Cutouts

The swarm picked up today was a typical swarm in a tree, and everything went as planned. Trimmed the tree limbs around the swarm and trimmed the branch the swarm was on while placing it into the swarm trap. The bees were all nestled in, and they are awaiting their new home! There was another call that was a cutout in a wall, but the homeowner is leaving town...tomorrow morning! Well that was not going to happen today, but the owner has an Arizona contact to keep in touch so the hive does not become huge by neglecting to get it removed sooner than later. Will keep updated on the progress of this hive. Drove by a place of business in the city today where there was reported bees. I noticed the bees just happily flying in and out of the hive they made. Well the only issue is, the property owner was called about 5 days ago now, and did not respond. Well I hope not too many people or children get stung since this owner doesn't care to have them safely removed...will keep you updated on that as well.

A queen is thought to be made not born

Interesting little bit of information for you. The queen bee has her own cell (looks like a little upside down cup, or nutshell) and she is also fed a higher protein diet called royal jelly. She is actually born sooner than worker bees and is bigger and slightly different in color. In some cases a worker may acutally take the place of a queen if something happens to the queen. Either way it is noteworthy that a queen is fed different food and emerges as a queen!