Dear Steven,
When I was a kid of 9 - my two sisters and me visited our divorced and re-married mother in Stoney Point, Oklahoma - (about 20 miles over the border of Arkansas from Fort Smith).
There I met Mr. Goats (a near relative by marriage).
He welcomed me in and said his bees were ready to swarm.
I'd been a beehive watcher for years and I couldn't wait...
Suddenly a keening, humming from inside of the hive box was followed by a flood of flying and circling bees. They were about 35 yards in diameter.
The two of us took a tin pan each and a large spoon each and began to bang on them to (he said) confuse their communication and make them settle nearby as preferred to flying away from our capture.
They did settle on a plum branch in the yard and hung like a huge bunch of grapes.
Mr. Goats got his new hive box and picked the queen from the settled swarm and put her and a double handful of hangerson bees into the hive box.
During the night, the remainder of the swarm followed them in.
He told me that he'd doctored the new box by rubbing it inside with mint leaves.
You can believe I was thoroughly hooked.
Mr Goats was also digging a 6' diameter dug well - to replace his bore hole well. He claimed a big dug well with a field rock facing (facade) - a wooden crossmember with a large noisy pulley wheel to pull up a bucket of cold well water on a hot day was a "great comfort" for a "grass widder batchelor" in his retirement years.
Mr. Goats was my first encounter with a beekeeper; well digging philosopher and nanny goat owner but in subsiquent years I acquired all of them...; bees; goats and a copy of Lin Yutang's "Importance of Living".
I only visited him about 5 days, all told, but it was a great experience for me.
We lunched each day on 2 split biscuits each, with pan fried country ham and tomato slices and a large green onion (handheld) and a cup of "nanny goat" milk.
I hardly saw my mother that visit but I never forgot Mr. Goats and his quest for "Great Comfort" and how Bee Watching was an important part of it all. Good luck and great comfort with your bees. Elbert
