Unprepared

It’s after Mid April and you’d think I be prepared, but I wasn’t. I was driving into town this morning and I could see it there in a tree hanging down like a dark stocking loaded with plums. It was a swarm of honey bees.

You probably are a person that has the ability to see things that others don’t because you are tuned into something so well because of association. I notice horses, chickens and honeybees. I noticed this swarm from 300 feet away. It hung low branch of a fruit tree. Had I been prepared I could have walked up to it and placed the five-pound cluster into a box and I would have a new colony of honey bees. I wasn’t prepared but I hoped for the best.

I went to town on my errand and later I went back home to get some swarm gear, but when I returned to the house where the bees were I found they had already been taken by another swarm hunter that can spot bees from 300 feet away or they had flown to a new location.

Honey bees are valuable not only because of all the things they do for agriculture and mankind and the honey and wax they produce, but they are valuable because these days a good five pound colony sells for around $85. Last year I collected four or five swarms. Every year I hope for more.

So from now until Mid-July I will be prepared with a bee box and a spray bottle of sugar water in the back of my truck for any other swarms I may come upon.