Here is a project I did last year at the request of a freind who catches many wild swarms of bees, some that have often made their homes in and around others houses and gardens, sometimes they move into your loft or porch and have already begun to make a new family.
When this happens removing them can be quite tricky, this device is a bee hoover that collects the majority of the colony when you start removing pannels etc the colony can get irrate and go on the attack.. Each sting you get is a dead bee, so collecting them on mass saves them for later. Once the majority have been collected the two doors can be closed and the bees are captured, the lid can also be removed at this stage to inspect the colony and allow ventilation to prevent over heating.
Its basically a box within a box, that connects to a hoover on the top which sucks and the opening on the side has the collecting hose to point into the void using extensions if needed, the seperate flap in one corner is slid open or closed to regulate the vaccum pressure, full open there is just enough suck for the bees to almost flay down the hosee without harming them.
Shown here from both sides and in the closed position.
The two shots above show the lower floor in the open and closed position.
Show above in the in situ position to finally release the bees into the prepared hive, where the brood and comb has been transfered from their temp home previously in your shed of loft, When the hoover box has been placed on top of an existing empyty hive, the lower doors are then opened safely for the bees to escape down into the box below to carry on taking care of their brood or young, the bonding is so strong they readily move down into the space below.
Showing the foldable brood frame which existing comb containing brood is placed then closed then placed in the box below to entice the workers down into their new hive complex.
It works really well and saves thousands of bees dieing if the sting you.
