[mburbank]

The bees are following a new queen and will not make a hive until she's mated and settled. It's a cluster of bees, the start of a new hive community. Ths happens when a previous hive exceeds it's popuation density and a second queen is born.

Incidentally, this is how the Bee Beard trick works, and how domestic bee keepers start new hives. The new queen is placed in a box, and about half the hive will follow her and settle wherever she settles. It's scary but they're fairly docile creatures in this state.

It takes a full year to produce enough honey for a human to harvest.

also? They communicate the location of nectar to each other by dancing.

We keep bees at the Museum of Science.

On the downside, the jerkoff at animal control had no way of knowing if this bee swarm was making it's final stop and should have just told you to sit tight for a few hours and see if they were still there, which is just what you did.