AdamD wrote:It seems that many people put swarms on local groups in Facebook nowadays (Which is fine as I don't get the call!) I get calls nearly every day about something or other - "I have a bumble bee in my garden, do you want it?" was a good one this year! So far, only two genuine swarm calls received. One in a chimney on a 3 storey building which I would not be able to get and another in an unshakeable trellis where I saw the queen as I smoked them up into a box and caged her which made it quite easy.
Interesting you say that Adam, I used to get many swarm calls a day over a hot weekend a few year back. Maybe up to thirty swarm calls over the season. Over the last five years they have tailed off and most that I have received have been in buildings and irrecoverable (to me, anyway). I am still on swarm lists but wonder if there are just a lot more people collecting nowadays with fewer people declining to collect. It was once a commonplace occurrence after the first few of the season for older beekeepers not wanting any more colonies to be phoning round to get someone else to do the call out? I did wonder if some just left the calls to go to ansaphone as they always became mysteriously unobtainable on certain hot weekends
. I also notice the BBKA swarm collectors map shows many more names locally than once upon a time, which is great to see.
Domestic harmony often got pretty stretched as another weekend's plans were interrupted by a succession of stressed householders leading to dashing off across the County. Oddly as an aside, I have not seen an accessible prime swarm for ages - most have been relatively modest castes. I wonder if that is a function of more feral colonies?