In this tutorial, Laurence Edwards of Black Mountain Honey walks viewers through the practical steps for preparing and positioning bait boxes (also called nucs) to attract and capture honeybee swarms. He emphasizes that the boxes must be off the ground, ideally as high as safely possible, but not necessarily in a tree. The optimal box is about 40 L (a 12‑frame box) with only the top six frames installed; these frames should be well‑used, dark, and “manky” to carry the scent of bees. No mesh should be present – the floor must be solid, achieved by covering mesh with Correx. The box should be watertight, have a small entrance (≈ size of a 50p coin) preferably facing south, and contain no food or feeders. Only two bait boxes per apiary/site are recommended, spread across multiple locations to increase capture chances. Before deployment, the frames must be treated with a certified wax‑moth product (e.g., Sertan) to protect them over the summer. Edwards also notes that the method is based on research by Tom Seeley and incorporates advice from fellow beekeeper Richard Noel. The video serves as a concise “top‑up” to his earlier, more detailed guide.
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Hi, I'm Laurence Edwards from Black Mountain Honey. Welcome to another episode of No Nonsense Beekeeping. Today we're going to look at how we put up bait boxes to attract swarms. So I know we did this video a while back, I've had loads of interest, loads of questions from people across all social media platforms and on YouTube, so I just thought I'd do a quick top-up video just to show you again how to set them up, where to place them. It doesn't need to be high, high up in a tree if you haven't got a ladder, and you don't feel safe going up trees, you can kind of just get them as high as you possibly can. The key thing is that they need to be off the ground. So just to summarize again, the really, really key messages that I said in my last video: size is important. You're looking for around 40 litres. I use a BS Polynuc 2-in-1 box or a Maysmoor box with the additional brood extension, so essentially 12 brood frame size. I only have frames in the top half. That's the way that I do it. So you've basically got space for 12 frames, but you're only filling 6 of them. You use nice, horrible, black, manky frames. The older the better. The box should be used. It should be a well-used box that smells of bees. There shouldn't be any food present either in the frames or in the feeders or anywhere, otherwise it'll just get robbed out. Lemongrass oil is a good attractant, but you don't necessarily need it if you've got good black frames. No mesh, everything should be solid in all areas, and I think that's about it. So I'll just quickly show you again how I set them up and where I place them. So this is one of my mazes nucs. As you can see, failed colony, still got the old queen cage in there, use that later. You can actually see where the little mini colony's dwindled on that one. No worries, Wipe off the dead bees. Doesn't matter about a bit of mould, absolutely fine. It's empty though, that's the important thing with that, it's empty, there's no feed in it. Okay, so we've got that, that's our good frame. Even if you've only got one of these frames, that will do. You don't need 6 really, really black frames. I just like to keep the top full because it means that I don't need to keep on going around and checking to see where these swarms are. I've got a couple of weeks to realize that there's something in them. So one really manky frame, Again, you can see the remnants of a dwindled colony. Get rid of that. But again, important, drawn comb's good, foundation is all right, definitely no stores. So I'll take the top box off, and then if you've got any good manky frames on the bottom one, you're going to adopt them in the top one. So all of my top frames are really, really good, no need to swap them. Take out the excess frames, get rid of all the gunk. Don't clean it though. But you see there, we've got the mesh. We don't want mesh, so we take a piece of Correx and we pop our Correx in. So there's basically no mesh in there now. The bees think that's a solid base. We put our 6th frame back on top, no feeder, and then we put the roof on. Then we strap that back up. So a lot of the questions that I had last time around this was, do I really need to climb 5 meters up into a tree to put this? And if you can, yes, Get them up as high as they can possibly go, but the key message is keep them off the ground. If you put it on the ground, you'll be very, very lucky to catch a swarm. So even a tree like this, this will work. It's off the ground. You'll see, do you know what I mean, when swarms gather naturally, they gather on maybe like the underside of a branch like this. That would be a natural gathering place for a swarm, so just give them somewhere to go. And that's it, do you know what I mean? I'm going to strap that up now, that'll just fall out otherwise, but something like that, it's just off the ground, doesn't need to be right up in the tree. The mesh is covered up, that's the really important bit, so when the bees are checking it out, they don't know there's mesh there, they think it's a solid floor. It's in my apiary, that's a really, really keen important one for me, because if I lose swarms from my own bees, I kind of got a half chance of catching them. So I'm not necessarily targeting wild swarms here. I'll get whatever kind of goes in there, but if my own bees swarm, I've got a chance of catching them. So I'll get that one ratcheted up now and then we'll finish. So I'm just going to ratchet this one up now. Another thing to say though, something I missed out on the other video, is, um, don't stick 4 or 5 in the same place. Really, really kind of going to reduce your chances of catching a swarm by doing that. So if you put 4 or 5 nucs in a single place, you're likely to catch a swarm in one of them. But you've used 4 or 5 boxes, spread them out a bit. So on each apiary or each site, I have no more than 2 boxes, and then I just kind of spread them around. Put them in friends' houses, put them in your own garden, put them wherever you possibly can, and kind of just increase your likelihood by putting them in numerous spots. So like I say, no more than 2 per apiary, do as many as you possibly can, and then keep on checking them. And then just kind of tuck all of this away so it's not going to interfere with any wildlife. So one thing I nearly forgot, and this was basically the main reason that I was going to do this video, so it would have been funny if I forgot it again, but Richard Noel gave me some really, really good advice on my last video. And I mean, I look up to Richard. I think he's a really, really top beekeeper. All the videos that he puts out I think are really, really good, and I kind of listened to his advice, and he picked me up on something that I missed out on my last video, and it's really important. is that when you're getting these black frames and you're putting them in boxes like this and you're going to leave them, protect them from wax moth. Top bit of advice. So you need to spray them with Sertan or an approved wax moth treatment, and then that way when you come back to check in the summer, you're not just going to have a mess of wax moth larvae, you're hopefully going to have a swarm. So thanks, Richard. Thanks for taking the time to look at the video. Thanks for giving me the feedback, and now I kind of share that feedback with everyone else. So thanks for that. So that's it, we're at the end of the video. Like I say, it's just a bit of a top-up video, trying to keep them short and sweet again. So I've got some key messages in terms of catching swarms. So up off the ground, as high as you can go, but stay safe. No mesh anywhere on the box, really, really solid. Make sure it's watertight. You're looking at about 40-liter space is ideal. It was Tom Seeley who did that research, again, really, really reputable beekeeper. Good research done into that. I use a 6 frames over 6 frames method, and I leave the bottom 6 frames empty. So you've got a 12-frame box, only 6 frames in there. Use really horrible black, horrible comb. Treat the comb with a wax moth treatment, a certified wax moth treatment. Entrance no bigger than a 50p piece, preferably south-facing. Only 2 per apiary, and I think that's about it. So thanks for watching, and I'll see you next time.
