Hiving a swarm

[Frenchie]

Had to go away for a couple of weeks, returning last night. This morning one of my colonies swarmed. Managed to capture them and put in a spare hive. Within the hour they swarmed again. Managed to capture them again and put into the spare hive. This time I put a frame of brood in the hive and blocked them in. Plan to remove the entrance block tomorrow and position a Queen excluder over the entrance. Anything else I should do? Thanks.

 

[Antipodes]

Had to go away for a couple of weeks, returning last night. This morning one of my colonies swarmed. Managed to capture them and put in a spare hive. Within the hour they swarmed again. Managed to capture them again and put into the spare hive. This time I put a frame of brood in the hive and blocked them in. Plan to remove the entrance block tomorrow and position a Queen excluder over the entrance. Anything else I should do? Thanks.

My thought is that the queen excluder will be an issue for getting a virgin queen mated (if it isn't a prime swarm) as well as stopping drones leaving.

 

[Frenchie]

Thanks for your reply. Almost certain it's a prime swarm.

 

[Antipodes]

Thanks for your reply. Almost certain it's a prime swarm.

I'm not sure what frames you have in with them but as well as the frame of brood, you could add some empty drawn (used) brood frames too. Sometimes a cast swarm can be quite big. I caught one last year that I thought was a prime but it had two virgins in it.