Improving your chances of claiming a swarm
From: Gerald Przybylski (gtp000000gmail.com)
Date: Thu, 20 Mar 2025 13:22:12 -0700 (PDT)

Hi William,
The swarm calls are filtered by the volunteers, then
the swarms are posted to the email group.
The First response gets the call. 
    We ask that those who have collected a swarm in the last day or two hold off a few minutes before trying to claim another one.
    Occasionally we have to remind the group to be generous with not trying to go after every swarm they see.
    Sometimes you will see that the first responder is willing to defer to someone who doesn't have bees.
The person who gets the call should be able to hit-the-road almost right-away. 
    We've had swarms leave before, or just at the time the responder arrives.   few minutes are important.
When swarm postings are 10 or 15 minutes old, anyone may make a claim... whether they have bees or not, whether they took a swarm that day or not, etc
    because that gets a responder to the bees, and frees up the volunteer.

We're about 50 swarms into the season so far.
We expect perhaps 300 by July, most of which will be in April and May. 

If you can set up your email client to poll for new messages more often, and Alert you, you improve your chances of being first.

If you don't have a bait-hive set up in your yard, you should.  One year I had five move-ins by June from one hive.
As Phil points out, it's like fishing.  
If you have extra equipment, impose on friends in the area to host bait hives for you.
If you have a colony about to swarm,  split it.
jerry




On 3/20/25 12:38 PM, william wiskes via swarm-list wrote:
I haven’t used the swarm list this season. Would I not be next?
-William

On Mar 20, 2025, at 12:37 PM, Mike S via swarm-list <swarm-list [at] alamedabees.org> wrote:


Claim to Jeff

On Thu, Mar 20, 2025, 12:29 PM Mike S <mjstirni [at] gmail.com> wrote:
One of my hives has swarmed, I don't have room for it.  Anyone want it?  6 ft up in my lemon tree

I’d happily take unless someone without bees gets back to you in short order! 10 minutes off. 

--------------------------------------
Jeff Horwitz
(202) 480 4453

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Safety first! No swarm is worth risking injury to self, or host.
Make sure you're familiar with the swarm catching guidelines at
<https://www.alamedabees.org/swarm-catching-guidelines/>.

To unsubscribe or modify your subscription options, to learn how
to filter these messages, or to view the archives, see:
<https://www.alamedabees.org/swarm-list-tips/>.

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