Like an old Alfred Hithcock movie..

[Hotzcatz]

When did the bees move in? Are you sure they are honeybees? Are they in a still in a swarm? Are they easy to reach? Can you post a picture of them? If they are truly honeybees and in a swarm and reachable, then I could use another hive of bees.

[Jeffhale]

I had an episode last year, in Joplin Misery, (side joke) What happened to the California surfer that Moved to Missouri?

He lived in misery.

Anyways, one morning the tree in front of my porch had a huge mound of bees. It looked like a large hive had been made, overnight. Thousands off bees in a large clump, about 12-15 ft up the tree, only 15 ft from my porch too.

I called the health department, dog-pound, (animal control) and anybody else I could think of. I learned quit a bit about them too, especially that there were quite a few Bee Keepers who gladly come out and take the bees, at no charge.

What had happened was; a hive in a large building produced their annual second queen. When it reaches the right age the new queen moves away from the nest. But, surprising ,was to learn that this huge hive now on my tree was at least half of the hive from the building. The new queen takes them and they hunt for a new place. My tree was just a temporary stop while another location was being sought.

Anyways, anyways, the bee keepers who happily removed them for me also told me, while they were interested in the whole group of bees, it was this new young queen which was thier main intrest. They didn't exactly say the monetary value of this queen but I got the impression it could be worth a few hundred dollars. And that during off seasons they had to pay some good amount of money for young queens.

I think this is the second time I've read about paying to have a similar situation removed.

Amd I imagine that, if you do have a young queen moving near your house, you might be able to find a keeper who will gladly remove the queen and her workers at no charge as well.

Perhaps just knowing that these young queens have great value might be an incentive that will save you some bucks for removal.. providing this is the case or reason of your troubles, a new young queen.

[Hotzcatz]

If the bees are still there and reachable, I'll come get them if you don't want them (no charge) but you may want to keep them for yourself.

One of the difficulties with getting a swarm of bees is there aren't any bee supply stores on this island. Actually, there aren't any in the whole state that I know of. So when a swarm appears you can put them in a wooden box until you get your hive equipment. However, by the time the hive equipment gets here the bees will already be settled into the wooden box and hard to move.

[Hotzcatz]

Oh, a queen bee is about $18 plus shipping, if you want to buy one.

http://www.konaqueen.com/

[Hotzcatz]

Here is a link to a site about starting a small honey producing operation, although they consider "small:" to be 1,000 hives: http://www.sfc.ucdavis.edu/pubs/SFNews/a.../94032.htm

Here is a description of a basic beehive which is sometimes hard to figure out until you can get a picture, diagram or good description of it:
Hives--Bee hives are stacks of four-sided, bottomless boxes that hold wooden frames upon which the bees build their combs. Each hive has a bottom board and cover. The bees glue the small cracks between the components together with "bee glue" (propolis). The frames rest on ledges cut into the top of the boxes. Sheets of embossed beeswax (foundation) are attached in the frames to provide the bees with the midribs for their new combs. The bees extend the foundation wax and add more to it and draw comb cells out of each side of the sheet. The comb cells are used for food storage, clustering, raising baby bees, and air conditioning.

(Note: the bottomless boxes are called "supers" or "brooders" and other appellations despending on their size and location in the stack.)

Here's a link to one of the major beekeeping equipment suppliers: http://www.dadant.com/

[sittall]

A colony of honey bees moved inside the decking of my front lanai. I eventually had them removed by asking the honey sellers at the farmers markets if they knew of anyone who could use more bees. Someone gave John’s phone number. Left a message for him this morning to see if it was OK to post his phone number. If he’s looking for more bees, I will let you know. Here is a link to pictures of the bee removal process. He used a converted shop vac to suck em up. The honey was delicious, got to lick it off the honey combs John removed

http://www.flickr.com/photos/8290775@N07...214697241/

The honey bees are very gentle, almost too gentle. I wanted to do an experiment using bee venom as therapy for arthritis in my fingers. The only way I could get a bee to sting me was to put it on my hand and then forcibly encourage him by slowly squashing the poor thing. The therapy was painful and not particularly successful . Wouldn’t recommend it.

[sittall]

Let me try posting that link again. If it doesn't work by clicking on it, you may have to copy and paste it.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/8290775@N07...214697241/

[Beachboy]

I want to thaNK everybody who offered their solutions to my problems. Worrying that my kids would get stung, I felt the need to move on the problem rather quickly. The day that I posted this thread I went outside that night and rather hastily sprayed Ortho's 'Home Defense' around the area I saw the Bees during the day. Next morning I saw a few Bees flying around. But it appeared they moved on!? I hope I didn't kill them all?

[Kapohocat]

Just a smll problem we ran into doing exactly what you did, BB, was that the next time the bees appeared the bee guy wouldn't come and get them because they had been sprayed before with insecticide. So make sure you got all the bees and whatever nest they made.