A late August swarm

We had just returned from an overnight with Julie and her children (a lovely time was had by all) and I looked out at the yard and saw bees flying around an unusual area, between the plum tree and the roses.  I went to look and saw a small cluster on one of the rose bushes (Elina, to be precise), only a dozen or so feet from the hives.

The swarm on the rose bush

I prepared a nuc to capture them.  Swarms this late in the year have a very low chance of survival.  This is because the honey flow is over so they cannot collect the necessary resources to survive. (Resources for bees, that is.)  Also. this swarm was quite small without enough workers to collect what is there.  I pondered my choices: let them alone and sink or swim; collect them and feed them until spring; collect them and add some bees and brood from another hive; collect them and give them some frames of honey.  I decided on the last choice.  It was pretty hot, so I chose to wait for it to cool down.  The cluster was being harassed by yellow jackets, and about an hour later, I saw the swarm on the move. 

The same bush, one hour later

I followed the bees to where they had clustered on my neighbors lemon tree

The cluster was a bit bigger than my fist.  I shook them into a nuc box where they spread out on the bottom and sides.  I looked for and spotted the queen.  By the time I got the camera up, the bees had covered her.

The queen is under all these bees

I do not know if this is clustering of if they are balling her.  I certainly hope it is the former.
I now went to get the frames of honey from the other hives.  I looked in both deeps of #1 and #3 and found no frames of honey.  Bad news for the planned fall honey harvest!  Now I will wait until spring and collect any honey left in the supers. 
How to feed the bees in the nuc?  I really did not want to feed them sugar water all winter long and perhaps they just need some to get them established.  I had some containers of honey soaked cappings from last year's harvest.  I smeared this onto a frame and put that into the nuc along with two frames of drawn comb (one with some old bee bread) and two foundationless frames with hand-sized drawn comb.

Honey soaked cappings smeared onto frame with some comb

I am pessimistic regarding the swarm's survival, but one never knows, do one?