Swarming Bees

Back yard beekeeping has it's joys and thrills and yesterday was no exception.  While outdoors weeding and working on our wood fired pizza oven (more to come on that subject) the bees started swirling around our apple tree like a bee tornado.  The sound was amazing but a little scary.  Soon they buzzed into a tight ball and we knew they had formed a swarm.   We found out this often will happen on a sunny day that has followed many days of rain.  That describes our spring this year!  The bees will form a new group when too overcrowded and we'll know better next year.   Beeing fairly novice beekeepers (actually Robb is the one working the bees and I usually supervise), we had never managed a swarm before so Robb contacted a person from the local beekeeper association and he came out and gave Robb a hand.  Good deal for him, he gets the bees.  Good deal for us, we didn't know what to do!  So now the hive is split and we are left with I hope a manageable number and enough to keep us in honey for the year.  Hope to get enough honey this year to try and make some mead.