When swarms are under head height they are usually fairly straight forward to shake and box. When they are 10 metres up in a tree, that is a very different challenge. That is when we use the “bucket on a stick”. This device can be extended to about 12 metres in length, but is pretty unwieldy. It’s amazing how heavy a bucket full of bees is at the end of the pole even at 6 metres. It is definitely a two person job.

I have used this device quite a few times and every time it has taken 2 or 3 goes to bring down the queen. This job removing a swarm out of a pecan tree proved quite a challenge and after 17 attempts and most of the bees on the ground and moving onto the catch box it was time to get out the chainsaw and bring the branch, bees and all, down.

Cutting a limb this big is really a last resort. Besides the risk of killing the queen, if the branch falls to the ground with a thump you end up with a bunch of unhappy bees and a general state of chaos for a while. It’s always best to have the smoker primed in these cases. Fortunately my client Nick did a great job with the chainsaw, bringing the branch down in slow motion. It was only the last metre or so that the branch really dropped and the bees didn’t seem too phased.

Eventually after more than 3 hours the queen was finally captured. The pursuit of the queen can be all consuming, but for 2 guys to spend this much time trying to wrangle these bees into a box was probably a false economy. Luckily we love bees and it not all about the money!