Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => The Roundtable => Topic started by: RoadKingLarry on March 02, 2022, 03:20:23 PM
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I've been keeping bees with marginal success for 6 years now. I've mowed around them, I've sat and watched them for extended periods photographed them and worked them with no issues. Haven't had any issues being around them tending the garden and blueberry bushes close to the hives. I've only been stung maybe half a dozen times total since starting with the bees and that was when working them. I've never had much reaction from the stings other than a little localized swelling and itching after the initial "sting" of the sting. Usually a mosquito bite causes me more irritation.
I went into winter with 5 hives and this morning confirmed all five have survived the winter.
I've been using a 5 gallon poultry waterer as a spring feeder for a couple of years. I filled it today (1/1 sugar syrup) and set it out about 10:00 am.
The hives are on the periphery of my 1/4 acre garden plots. I went down after lunch on my mower to do a little clean up mowing of the garden debris left from last season and the girls absolutely lit me up! Not sure it it was the mower that set them off or what, but they were all over me in seconds and I had to turn it around and beat a hasty retreat out of there. Couple of stings on my face and neck and several on my arms and back through my t-shirt and 4 on my hands.
As a precaution I took some Benadryl and then had my wife extract the stingers from my face and neck. As soon as I've decided I'm not going to have any major adverse reaction I'm going to suit up and light a smoker and walk down to the bee yard and see if I get the same reaction just walking in.
I'm really hoping I'm not going to have to work that garden plot in a bee suit all year.
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Do you think something else had already set them on edge?
Maybe you can set up a bypass switch on your mower to generate more smoke.
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Is it possible an africanized hive moved in? I didn't think they got as far north as Tulsa but there's always a first for anything.
Brad
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Yikes! That's no fun...
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Do you think something else had already set them on edge?
Ukrainian bees?
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We've not seen any Africanized bees in this area, I'm about 30 miles as the bee flies north of Tulsa so not really worried about that. All 5 of these hives were pretty docile last year maybe just a perfect storm of first really warm day, the feeder being out and my riding the mower into their flight path.
I used the same feeder in the same location last year and had no issues walking down to watch them in "street clothes".
I'll report back after I visit them in the full length bee suit.
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Ukrainian bees?
We do have Russian bees in the area.
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My understanding is the Africanized bees largely bred with local bees and calmed down. Some hives can still be touchy.
My brother has gotten into bees heavily the last couple years. He has a couple hives near his house that can be pretty defensive. Those hives are active and make a lot of honey so he doesn't mind.
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What caliber for bees?
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What caliber for bees?
Well, BB of course :facepalm: ;/
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I mow right by mine too. I guess if pissy keeps up once food is plentiful find which hive and give that queen the old hive tool test.
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A couple of videos from this afternoon. This time I was in my full length bee suit. Pardon the poor camera handling, the gloves make it a bit tough to manipulate the camera.
(https://live.staticflickr.com/31337/51915169390_51e871785f_z.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2n6yPaq)
(https://live.staticflickr.com/31337/51914565506_ddedb617f1_z.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2n6vHDC)
They drained that feeder in less than 4 hours there was about 4.5 gallons in it when I got it set up and got it to stop leaking.
I'll fill it again tomorrow.
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Well, BB of course :facepalm: ;/
.218 Bee.
If you want more performance, .17 Ackley Bee.
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Well, BB of course :facepalm: ;/
Ooog.
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.218 Bee.
If you want more performance, .17 Ackley Bee.
.22 Hornet?
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.219 Donaldson Wasp
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CCI Shot Shells.
22Plinkster has some videos shooting at carpenter bees.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-6SzYGkxPg&t=3s
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhOgYN5SDQg
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So 24 hours later I've got a few little, kind of itchy, bumps on my neck and jaw line where they nailed me and a little bit of swelling on the 1st finger pad on my left hand middle finger but my right hand isn't looking too good. Hand is swollen up across the back and around to the base of the thumb where the 2 stings were and I've got some swelling around and across the inside of the wrist. Not painful or warm to the touch nor any discoloration beyond a little redness, just mostly looks a little ghastly. If it's not better by morning I will seek medical treatment
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My understanding is the Africanized bees largely bred with local bees and calmed down. Some hives can still be touchy.
When I was 10 years old (1986ish) in Brazil, we had a hive, pretty docile, no major issues. Our beekeeper friend that tended the hive for us had gotten pretty complacent because they were "tame" and "his" bees. They never bothered him even when he was cleaning/replacing frames. Maybe one sting a year. Well, this was around the time that some idiot brought a bunch of African bees over in the hopes of crossbreeding them and getting the best of both worlds - the docile nature of the western honeybees, and the increased production of the African bees. Well, they were a little more docile than pure African bees, but not much. And they began to spread north from southern Brazil. We didn't know it, but our colony cross bred over a year with an African hive. They were calm over the winter, but that spring, the beekeeper came to check on the hive and was attacked. The entire colony it seemed swarmed out at once. He was stung over 100 times, through his bee suit. Mom had taken myself and my younger brother out (I don't recall where), and had someone watching my infant twin brothers. She heard the screaming, saw him being attacked by the bees, and thankfully had the presence of mind to cover herself and the twins under a heavy blanket on the bed. There were dozens of stingers embedded in the blanket when it was inspected. That's the only thing that saved their lives. The beekeeper escaped by jumping in the pool. He was hospitalized in critical condition (and my understanding is that it was pretty touch and go). But the bees managed to kill our dog (100+ lb Fila pup).
We learned after the fact that there were the Africanized colonies moving from the south. My parents ended up killing the rest of the hive over the next couple of nights - they had to attach insecticide foggers to the end of 12+ foot bamboo poles to spray into the hives while another person watched for any bees that came past the foggers too fast to be killed right away and hit them with more spray.
Ever since then I've been wary of bees, and especially if there's any possibility of them having been Africanized.
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What caliber for bees?
Nuke from orbit
It IS the only way to be sure
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The APS-approved answer is always detcord.