Bee problem

[GA Bowhunter]

Y'all remember the killer bee movie from the 70's? They got the bees to get on a car, moved it into the Superdome and turned the AC down (IIRC).

I was a kid and scared to death of getting attacked by killer bees. I don't think they have made it to GA yet and it's been 50 years.

[DUKFVR]

Fire Baby Fire! I would have burned the tree down.

Hope you get the swelling down & get to feeling better.

[BlackHogDown]

Jeez. Glad you're ok. In for pics of the removal.

[Ætheling]

Jeez. Glad you're ok. In for pics of the removal.

Will do. At this point I deserve a couple jars of honey. Gonna be the most painful and expensive honey I ever ate haha.

[MASTERS]

I have run across two Africanized hives, yes they are relentless. The first hive, I was talking to a woman in her driveway, about her car, when she started waving her hands and then hitting at her hair. I was looking at her like she was nuts. Then she ripped my cap off, started waving it around, then threw it on the ground. At that point, I still had not seen any bees, and thought she was nuts. The instant, my cap stopped moving about 20 bees came out of nowhere and flew into the cap. She took my cap and and started waving it around very fast, every time, she stopped waving it, the bees swarmed the cap. I took it from her walked out to my car, waved it around got the bees out of it, then tossed it in the car. That ****** off the bees, then they came after both of us. They chased both of us about 200 yards down the street. We eventually went back and saw a large swarm on the front of her house.

Some years later I had a huge hive in a wall of my house, old wooden farm house. That turned into about a three day mess. I discovered them when I was working on my car in the garage. Then saw bees swarming in the garage, the hit me a few times, I went outside and stood in front of the house. Saw there were a bunch more bees flying around outside the garage, which was detached from the house. They were flying a big loop around the garage like they were looking for the source of the noise. I had been banging on something.

Then when I walked towards the house, I saw there was a huge cloud of bees between the house and the garage. Skip swarm, I really mean cloud, it was dense with bees. I was done working. I went in the house. Waited an hour went back out and everything was good. So I stupidly went back to work, within minutes, I had bees swarming around in the garage again. Some popping me, but most just zipping around looking for the source of the noise. So I went back outside again, sure enough they were going in a loop around the outside of the garage again, and then a cloud between the house and garage. I went back in the house and decided the bees had to go.

I bought a case of wasp spray, and a case of bug bombs. Then waited till that night and started WW III. It got very bad, I almost had to abandon the house. I found every hole in that wall of the house, and plugged it up, with spray foam or corks. I spray foamed every crack, gap, ECT I could find they might be able to get out of. Then the next night I pulled a cork out of the wall, had the case of bug bombs ready. Then started popping caps, setting them off one at a time, then putting the top of the bug bomb over the hole in the wall. I put the contents of 8 bug bombs in that wall, then put the cork back in the hole, and went into the house.

On the inside of the house, you could hear a pretty loud hum from the wall, that wall was warm. I was able to figure out how large the hive was, but how much of the wall was warm. I realized pretty quickly I started a war with a monster hive, they were ******. Well eventually they found a way out of the wall, then things got bad. The swarmed out the back wall of the house, flew around to the back sliding glass door, where the living room light was shining threw. They covered the sliding glass back door and had a very dense swarm on the back porch. Then they found ways to get inside the house from the room where they had the hive in the wall. I had probably 500 POed bees inside the house flying around.

I went outside with the case of wasp spray, had a can of wasp spray stuffed in all four pockets of my shorts, then stood off in the darkness outside the back porch and started hosing them down, with wasp spray. It took about 10 cans to wipe out the majority of the ones on the back porch. When I went back inside the house, that's when I found I had about 500 inside the house. I turned off every light in the house, except for the one living room light. Then did the same thing I did outside. Stood in the dark and started hosing down the bees going to the light. I killed all of them in the house. Then had to go spray foam every crack, and gap on the inside of the house, in the end of the house where the hive was. That next day, there were many thousands of dead bees on the back porch, and probably over 500 dead bees inside the house.

The next day, I had another case of wasp spray, decided to continue the war during the day, after I came up with the idea of driving my truck right up to the side of the house, then cracked the window and started hosing them down on the side of the house. As I emptied a can, I would roll the window back up. grab another can, put the straw on it, then crack the window and go back to hosing them down. I killed many thousands of bees that way, used up close to another case doing that.

I did some major damage that first night. Then we had round two the second night, then the final round the third night. By the fourth day, there were a lot less bees on the outside of the house. By the fifth day, the remaining hive left.

That hive had been in that wall for years, or there had been a hive of honey bees in that wall for years. I used to ride around on the lawn mower with them swarming around coming out of the wall above my head. Never bothered me. I could walk right past where they came out of the wall, while they were buzzing around with a small swarm, and a bunch on the wall. Never had any problems with them. I never saw them swarm like they did that day I was working on my car. I don't think the hive had ever been anywhere near the size it got to, when they got aggressive. They had filled up almost that whole wall, on that end of the house, judging by what part of the wall was warm and what part was cold.

It did not take me long to decide they had to go, the garage was 20 yards from the house, me banging around inside the garage was causing them to make a huge cloud between the house and garage, then a large swarm flying around and in the garage. There was no way, I was going to be able to do much of anything outside the house.

In all of that mess, I never got stung once. They hit me numerous times, when I was in the garage, but they never stung me. In my two encounters with Africanized bees, I found they give you warning, to clear the area. They fly into you full speed, feels about like someone thumping you with a finger. When you feel them start hitting you, clear the area right now, you are getting warned, they are only going to do that for so long, before they start stinging you. Both times I was getting hit in the garage, I calming walked out of the garage and stood about 50 yards from the garage, and watched what was going on.
In that first encounter, at that woman's house, she got them very riled with her waving her hands and then waving my ball cap around. After I threw the cap in the car, they started hitting me like machinegun fire. I figured they were about to light me up big time. So we both took off running. They chased us the whole distance, we ran at least 200 yards down the street, when we stopped there were still bees swarming around us. After a few minutes, they left and went back to the rest of the colony. At the house, I calmly walked out of the garage, with them hitting me, they stopped hitting me shortly after I got out of the garage. They did not follow me out across the yard, they kept flying around in the garage or around the outside of the garage.

Your reaction to them, seems to affect how they react to you. Fast movement seems to be bad, no matter what fast movement you are doing. I really don't want to test out my theory again, those suckers are scary. Had I known how huge that swam was at the house, I don't think I would have been so calm. I thought it was just 20 bees or so, till I got 50 yards or so from the garage, turned around and looked back. That's when I realized what I had just walked away from. I don't think I would have calmly walked away, had I known how big the swarm was outside the garage.

When I was inside the garage, I saw the bees flying around me, about the same time, they started hitting me. So I stopped what I was doing immediately, looked around and saw there were about 20 bees flying in a circle inside the garage, like they were hunting for the source of the noise. They were zipping past me, doing a loop the size of the inside of the garage. They did not seem to have any concern with me, when I was just standing there. When I started walking out, a few of them popped me, by the time I was 10 ft. from the garage, they quit popping me, and they never followed me. They were hunting for the source of the noise that set them off, and at the time, I was not making that noise, so they were flying in a loop around the inside of the garage hunting the source of that noise.
For years before those two incidents, I had talked to multiple people who live down in south Texas, where those bees are much more common. They all told me that noise sets them off. So that's why I stopped making any noise and stood there calmly, and they for the most part left me alone. I am sure, had I kept banging on whatever it was I was banging on, when the scouting party showed up, I would have gotten zapped numerous times, and had I had a normal swinging at them with my hands reaction, I probably would have been in for a very bad surprise when the rest of the war party joined in. They had some serious reinforcements outside that day.

I know that thumping, popping feeling well, when I feel it, I stop what I am doing immediately and calmly look around to see how many bees are around me. On a couple of other occasions, I have had small groups of bees, on those occasion, I only saw maybe five bees, don't know where the rest of them were, I did not want to meet the rest of the hive, so I quit doing whatever it was I was doing and left, the area.


Good luck with your bees, I would not want to mess with a hive of Africanized bees that are 40 ft. up in a tree.

I’d have just smoked them out of the wall from the inside and corked the hole in 10-15 minutes intervals. Push smoke in the wall for 2-3 minutes then wait about 15.

Make sure your insurance policy is up to date and put your mounts and guns in the car outside.

Been waaaay cheaper than $300 in wasp spray and bug bombs.

[Dusty Britches]

Y'all remember the killer bee movie from the 70's? They got the bees to get on a car, moved it into the Superdome and turned the AC down (IIRC).

I was a kid and scared to death of getting attacked by killer bees. I don't think they have made it to GA yet and it's been 50 years.

I remember that movie well and it made me scared to death of bee swarms. Individuals, no big deal. Swarms creep me out and scare me.

I have run across two Africanized hives, yes they are relentless. ....

Good luck with your bees, I would not want to mess with a hive of Africanized bees that are 40 ft. up in a tree.

Talk about a horror movie! I'm glad you won WWIII.

Africanized bees are the biggest reason I have a cab tractor. Now I need to make sure that AC is working.

OP - I hope you heal quickly and I'm glad you weren't seriously hurt. A feller in town was attacked while mowing a few years ago. He was in a coma for several days and spent some time in the hospital before he died.

[Aetheling]

Ok update time. Rain kept the boom truck from being able to get to the tree. Things dried up last week so this past Friday the crew shows up. Crew boss assesses the situation and says hell no to getting up that tree with those bees. I told him barring the bee situation I would just fell that tree along the woodline but the company owner said boom truck. Crew boss says not a problem to fell so he suits up and fells it while his guys are at their vehicles. The second that tree went down thousands swarm like a cloud and chased his *** to the truck and they run out like a bat out of hell lol. Owner calls me and said his crew boss said he never saw bees that aggressive before. Tree guy and bee expert said they would pack up and leave with the tree going down. We have been gone since Friday and got home today. They are still swarming around that tree right now lol. Bee guy should be out tomorrow to trap em. He said 92 hours max and they should have moved the hive which would be tomorrow morning. Surprised they are still swarming. Theyve had 76 hours to calm down lol.

[Aetheling]

So that no one gets confused I am the op. The update doesn’t support the special characters that were in my username so I have a new profile with a demotion to 8 point lol. Mary is helping me and has gone above and beyond to recover my old profile.

[DawgOnIt]

My brother-in-law has gotten into bee keeping and I've helped him successfully catch multiple hives from homes/trees/wherever, most are africanized. We definitely suit up each and every time we mess with them. Unfortunately there are times when catching them just can't be done. A very simple way to be done with them is Seven Dust. Blow it in the hive with a shop vac reversed, and they'll be dead by dawn. Hate to kill them, but if they can't be captured, you and your family's safety becomes an issue.

[SaltwaterSlick]

Dang Jeff, y'all be careful with your little ones being outside! Until those jokers are all, I mean ALL gone, they'll swarm as long as there's one left!! We had 2 run-in's with them on our old deer lease south of Del Rio several years ago... We were gonna take care of them ourselves... WRONG!! We sprayed 'em with everything we could think of (out of ignorance, we didn't know about Sevin dust blown out of a vacuum back then) I put straight gasoline in a pump up sprayer and sprayed it in the hole where their hive was! It didn't phase 'em one bit!! Wasp and Hornet spray didn't do anything to 'em but make 'em even madder!! We called an exterminator out of Del Rio... He came out and he had a contraption that was much like a small shop vac that he used high potency pyrethrin (Sevin dust on steroids)... It was a powder and he blew it into their hole... Just like you described, there was thousands and thousands of bees swarming out camp... next morning the ground was literally covered in dead bees!!

[SaltwaterSlick]

The second encounter was a hive built in one of our tower stands... It had a metal frame so we cut the wires holding it up and let it fall... Went back after dark and threw a coffee can full of gasoline on it and torched it! Came back later and recovered the square tubing frame and rebuilt the stand.

[Aetheling]

Dang Jeff, y'all be careful with your little ones being outside! Until those jokers are all, I mean ALL gone, they'll swarm as long as there's one left!! We had 2 run-in's with them on our old deer lease south of Del Rio several years ago... We were gonna take care of them ourselves... WRONG!! We sprayed 'em with everything we could think of (out of ignorance, we didn't know about Sevin dust blown out of a vacuum back then) I put straight gasoline in a pump up sprayer and sprayed it in the hole where their hive was! It didn't phase 'em one bit!! Wasp and Hornet spray didn't do anything to 'em but make 'em even madder!! We called an exterminator out of Del Rio... He came out and he had a contraption that was much like a small shop vac that he used high potency pyrethrin (Sevin dust on steroids)... It was a powder and he blew it into their hole... Just like you described, there was thousands and thousands of bees swarming out camp... next morning the ground was literally covered in dead bees!!

Thanks Charlie. Luckily they are on the other side of the shop so its acting like a wall to keep us out of their line of sight. No one is going anywhere near that area till they move off, are trapped, or killed. The crew boss said he has never seen a hive that big so not sure if trapping them is really an option. Think they would clog up multiple shop vacs lol. I can get into the shop from the opposite side and they aren’t 40 ft from the window.