TRAVERSE CITY -- Mike Street hoisted a tree branch with a massive cluster of honey bees stretching from his chest to his toes, like a proud fisherman showing off a record catch.
"When they hang this low, it's a perfect cluster to capture," said Street, as a small crowd gathered outside of Stromberg Carlson Products Inc. off Hammond Road in Garfield Township to watch him carefully remove two large bee clusters swarming outside the local manufacturing firm.
Company employee Russ Priest said he first spotted the bees Tuesday afternoon.
"I noticed thousands and thousands of something swarming in the parking lot," Priest said. He'd seen something like it before in his days working for the state Department of Natural Resources, but still marveled at the sight of what he estimated was a 50-foot wide swath of bees swarming up to 30 feet high.
Street said while the bees are feisty this time of year trying to get food, they are naturally docile and he didn't expect too much trouble as he worked the site without his full-body bee suit.
But if one stung him, Street said, the others could sense the threat and the pheromone released by the sting and swarm him.
Armed with a smoking can full of burning pine needles, a buttoned-up oxford, baseball cap, cloth gloves and a loose net for his head, Street went to work.
First he doused the swarm with smoke.
"The smoke calms them down," said Street, puffing clouds of smoke into the cluster. "The bees sense the smoke and think there's going to be a fire, so they stick together to protect the queen, who's in the middle."
He carefully cut the branch and held it up to show the 4-foot-long, foot-thick cluster of about 80,000 bees, before gently folding the cluster into a wooden box.
"We need to get the queen," Street said. "If I miss the queen, they'll just cluster up again."
Onlookers watched with amazement.
"Holy God, that's unreal," said Traverse City resident Becky Nickerson, after Street handled the clusters with little protection.
Street said the bees likely broke off from their original hive in a nearby orchard and were searching for a new home around the building.
After boxing up the biggest cluster, Street went for the second, smaller bunch.
"There's about 20,000 bees in that one," Street said. "If we don't catch them today they'll find someplace around here to nest."
Street is a Realtor by trade, but enjoys beekeeping as a hobby and owns his own bee farm.
Street attacked the smaller cluster with a hacksaw, separating the thicker branch from the tree and shaking the bees into a box in the back of his SUV.
It took a few tries to loosen the second queen's grip of the branch. But in the end, Street drove away with approximately 100,000 bees swarming in the back of his vehicle.
He estimates the larger swarm will produce about 10-15 gallons of honey next year.
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