“Two feet or two miles” is an old adage in beekeeping. This refers to the distance required to move a bee colony from one place to another. The saying means you should either move the colony within two feet of its location, or at least two miles from its location. This is because honey bees have a knack for returning home; which is great so long as we don’t move their home. A hive you shift just a couple feet can be readily located by a returning forager, and a hive you transfer a few miles away will trigger the bees to reorient to their new location. When I had an outyard, this worked well for me—I could truck swarms to their new home 30 miles away, guaranteeing they wouldn’t fly back to the the tree I took them from. But now with my bees in one apiary, and with bait hives set up around my bee yard to catch newly birthed colonies that outmaneuver my anti-swarming efforts, the “two feet or two miles” axiom has become inconvenient, if not impossible, for me to follow. So how do I move a swarm to a new hive that’s more than two feet away, but nowhere near two miles away?
This swarm trap was positioned in a tree 30 feet behind an empty space on a hive stand
Well, I start by carefully planning the locations of my swarm traps. I’ve kept traps anywhere from 5 feet to 500 feet from my bee yard. What I’ve noticed over the years is that my swarms generally avoid the traps at either extreme of that range, and instead prefer those that are within 100 feet of the bee yard. I don’t know if that’s common for all bees, or if it’s because of my specific terrain (rolling valleys), the ecosystem here (forests and pasture), or other factors unique to my area. But because of this, I don’t even bother setting up traps anymore that are more than 100 feet from my hives. In fact, I try to position traps in the edge of the woods about 30 feet behind my bees. The exact locations of my swarm traps depend on where I’m planning to hive the swarm.
Comb being constructed outside this flower pot swarm trap
The swarm trap gets secured to a tree about 10-12 feet off the ground. I use both handmade boxes and flower pot-style cardboard traps. The boxes are great because they hold deep frames for tidy comb-building. But they’re stupid heavy when you’re on a ladder trying to fasten them to a tree, and they need a platorm—either a limb or something you build—to keep them level and secure. The flower pots are great because they’re so light and easy to take up a ladder—I screw them into garden lattice (most people use plywood), which keeps them light and provides nice big holes for mounting and securing. The downside to a flower pot is that the bees build freestyle comb that needs to be cut out and moved into a frame when you re-hive them (which you shouldn’t put off for too long with this type of trap). For that, I wrap several rubber bands around a foundationless frame, tuck the comb between the rubber bands, and stick it in their new hive.
A deep frame with the foundation removed; the rubber bands will keep the comb in place until the bees attach it to the frame
When moving the swarm, which I typically do mid-day, I first remove the trap from its tree and place it next to the hive I intend to put them in. The bees—finding their home disturbed—will begin fanning their nasonov pheromone to let the rest of the colony know where they’re at. I’ll also spray a bit of Swarm Commander (or lemongrass oil) into the entrance of their new hive. Then I leave them alone for at least a few hours. During that time, foragers will return to find their home is gone. They’ll fly loops in front of their old tree for a while, but it’s close enough that the nasonov scenting will draw most of them to the new spot. The squirt of Swarm Commander will also start drawing some of the bees into the new box, where I assume they’re impressed by a couple frames of already-drawn comb.
I come back later in the day, usually after I finish working my other bees, and by then most of the foragers have been lured into the new position by their fanning sisters. If there’s still a cluster hanging out on the tree, it’s a good idea to make sure the queen isn’t also there. Then scoop them up and take them to the new location. Even if a few fly back to the tree, the nasonov will probably help them figure it out eventually.
One day after moving this swarm into a nuc box, the bees were ignoring their old tree
At this point I break open the swarm trap and move the bees into their new hive, propping the trap against the hive to help any stragglers find their way. Within a day or two, all the bees will be re-homed and they’ll be flying to-and-from their new hive, as if that’s where they wanted to live all along.