First batch of 
bees have arrived for the season. Should be at least 2 more batches comming.
I made a deal with a local honey producer 4 years ago. From April through September they get to use a small spot on my farm for their bees. They do all the bee work, and I get 5 gallons of honey at the end of the season plus a few pounds of comb.
Bee safety tip: Don’t eat bananas around honey bees. Something in bananas is close to the bee danger signal and it can make them go a bit nuts… found that one out the hard way. 27 stings and half a dozen stuck in my hair. 
thankfully I’m not overly sensitive to bee stings, but still not a pleasant experience. 
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That’s really cool that all you have to do to get 5 gallons of honey a year is let them sit in your yard for a few months. Also very good to know about the bee and banana danger.
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I’m hoping to catch a swarm or two this year, so I can get back into beekeeping.
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That is awesome! Around my part of the woods, the russians steal the rental hives and try to sell them. It is brutal on the orchards when they are pilfered. It is big business to hijack the bees this time of the year.
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Ii tried catching some swarms a few years ago. The first year I had the bees, the weather was unusually cold and wet. That appears to have triggered them swarming way more than usual. I saw at least 5 different swarms go off that year. Since then, I have seen just one or two. Really fun to watch.
I did manage to catch one swarm that first year. I noticed them settling on the end of a long tree branch. By the end of the day it was pulling the branch down to maybe 5 feet off the ground. I put an empty hive under it then hit the branch near the trunk with a big mallet. Bees mostly dropped right into the hive. By the next morning they had settled into the hive. So I put the lid on and moved them somewhere safe.
Sadly I did not feed them enough, and the hive died out after 3 months. I did not know much about bee keeping at the time.
I wish you luck on finding a swarm. Having bees around is great in many ways.
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That is awefull. (Sounds like parts of Portland where I used to live )
The bees make a HUGE difference in yield. My fruit trees have consistently yielded much better since the bees started comming. To the point I have had to change how I prune so the branches can handle all the weight.
Ironic aside: the bee company I work with is family owned and operated by Ukranian Immigrants. The 85 year old grandfather who started the company some 40 years ago, came out to my farm to do the initial survey. Super nice guy. The whole family is great. They brought all the family kids out here one year to run around and play with the baby chickens. That was a fun weekend.
