1 hive started and 1 swarm captured...

[bthomas67wagon]

Wow, I feel like I'm on a good start!!
So a little over a week ago, I picked up our first bee colony. Did the whole leave queen in box for 5-6 days, take out cork and put in marshmallow and check a couple of days later and she is out and in the brood box somewhere. Bees are "doing well" I think, because after a week they are in and out and we had a comb 12x12 inches. We were pretty excited!!! But... Last night when we pulled the empty queen case, the comb was attached to the queen case and fell/slid a couple of inches down (I think to the base of the brood box). After reading a couple of posts, I think it will be okay, but didn't want to be disruptive, so I left it. Okay or do I need to get it tied back up?

So as we were looking for a lost phone on our 20 acres, my wife spots a swarm. I quickly build a base plate, top plate and vent plate for an extra brood box we have, drive the suburban out and get it. (first time capturing a swarm) We did the best we could to get the whole swarm, take it out to our make shift box and introduce them to their new home. After 30 minutes, 90%+ of the new swarm was either in the box or trying to get in. They are still there this morning!!! Pretty neat (and saved me $100!!) :)

So the "bought" bees were lighter in color and from California.
The Swarm is much darker (black stripes are darker).

I'm in Ohio.
Is there a spot online for identify different breeds of bees?

[BeeMaster2]

Thomas,
The queen cage will be fine as long as you were able to put the frames back together. If not they will build burr comb between them. Remove it during your next scheduled inspection.

Try this site:
http://keepingbee.org/species-of-bees/

[BlueBee]

Regarding the color of the bees; the good news is your hive didn’t swarm (wrong color)! 

The darker colored bees are generally considered to be more of a Carniolan stock; although at this point most bees outside the breeders are just mutts.

Did you find the phone?

[BeeMaster2]

After finding a swarm, who cares about the phone.  :-D
Jim

[bthomas67wagon]

BlueBee - Yes. After an hour of walking around (which felt like 2 hours) in the sun after working all day on the property, she found that iPhone has a setting (if you turn it on in the phones settings) that will allow the iCloud to ping the phone through GPS. It gave a general 50x50 foot area. I looked and looked and after another 15-30 mins I heard a beeping 10 ft from me and the swarm. (she found that you can send it a signal to sound out a beep!!!) WAY COOL !!! (I immediately turned my setting on since I'm always around the property!!)

SawDSTMaker - I'm not so concerned with the queen cage, since they had eating through the marshmallow and the queen was not in the cage anymore and somewhere else in the hive. I was more concerned about the comb not being attached to anything anymore and that effecting the bees? If it's not attached, should I remove it? If I do it's that a lot of new bees that will not populate?

After 4 days they new swarm is still going in and out of the makeshift hive box. I'm waiting on some stuff from Mann Lake to transfer the new colony into.

I have some high hopes for this "bee thing" we are starting!!! We just moved in last year and the prior owner had 20-24 hives and sold honey from his roadside shed. Last Summer right after moving in, we had a HUGE swarm in almost the same spot as the one I just got. We didn't know what to do and thought WOW NEAT!!, but by next morning was all gone. (I now know it was a swarm, but didn't know then) so, IDK if bees come back to their breeding grounds? or if we will ever see another swarm, but if he see one once a year, I better start buying and building more hive boxes now!!

[GSF]

You probably couldn't have picked a better spot. Ain't no telling how many run away hives around there that will be throwing swarms.

[BeeMaster2]

Thomas,
Where is the comb that you say is not attached? Is it on the bottom of the box. Is it  still upright? If so the bees can grow it up and attach it on the bottom. After this hive is ready to be moved into a hive, about a week, rubber band it into a frame.
Jim