It's swarm season, and that big ball of bees hanging in a tree is called a "bivouac". In this state, they are undergoing a significant decision-making process. The life-and-death question to be answered is where to move next.
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While most bees, including the queen, wait patiently for the debate to end, a small team of a few hundred bees is out scouting locations for their next home.
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Just as bees use the waggle dance to describe the direction, distance, and value of a food source compared to other foraging bees, the scouts express their vote for a suitable location via the waggle.
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Once a consensus has been reached, the scouts will awaken the bivouac with a series of buzz runs, alerting the patiently waiting bees to warm their flight muscles in preparation for leaving en masse.
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As a beekeeper, if you can intercept the swarm and provide them with an alternative home, they might like it and hang around. If, on the other hand, you cage the queen for three days, the colony will happily establish themselves in the new home, whether they initially liked it or not.

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