Beemaster's International Beekeeping Forum
BEEKEEPING LEARNING CENTER => GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. => Topic started by: Jerrymac on June 26, 2005, 12:11:28 pm
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This lady had called me last weekend. She had bees in her wall. Her lawn guy had been attacked and wasn't coming back until the bees were gone. She had called the pest control people out twice. But she still had bees.
What the pest control people did, and why it didn't work. They drilled holes in the mortar between the bricks on the outside wall and injected their junk in there. This would be an air space between the brick and some sort of black insulation board. The bees were on the other side of this black board, between it and the sheetrock.
She wanted the bees gone before her kids got back home July 1st. We're thinking possibly African bees because of what happened to the lawnmower man. And they had to be all gone because her father, who was going to do the repairs, is alergic to bees.
So the easiest and cheapest way would be to go through the inside wall. Ofcourse she didn't want bees all over the house. What a delima.
We decided in order to get all the bees, it would have to be done at night. I showed up about three PM and installed a screened in area.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v225/Jerry-mac/Lubbees001.jpg
Then I waited until dark and went back to seek out the dreaded viscious bees. I first started out side where they were going into the wall. It was some dry rotted wood above the brick.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v225/Jerry-mac/Lubbees003.jpg
Well I didn't see anything there. So I venture into the house and tear into the portion of the bedroom wall where we were sure we had heard the bees. I cut out a section of the sheetrock and........ nothing. I shined a flash light up into the hole and.................. Nothing. Hummmmm.
I crawled up into the attick just to make sure they weren't up there before prceeding to tear out more wall. Because I could still hear them. No bee in the attick, but did disturb a sparrow.
So I go back and pull a chunck of sheetrock from the wall stud on the left side of the hole I made. There was some comb. No wild blood thirsty bees came pouring out.
So I start pulling chunks of sheetrock off, going down, to see how far the comb went. I then cut the sheetrock straight across and cleared oout enough so I could duct tape some plastic in there to keep anything, and bees, from going down. I also covered the other hole with plastic to keep bees from running and hiding over in there. I have at this point seen one bee.
Now I start pulling sheetrock off going up, trying to cut the comb loose from it as I go by running the hive tool up agaist the back of the sheetrock. I finally see three more bees, and finally here the rumbling of disturbed bees. But still no hoards of vows coming after me.
I finally get the wall cut out all the way to the top
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v225/Jerry-mac/Lubbees004.jpg
I thought this might have been a swam that had just moved in this spring. This come fills the 16 inch space between the wall studs and is about 40 inches long. I see some emerging bees. there were maybe twenty emerging bees. As far as any brood, that was it. Emerging bees. There were no queen cells. No drone cells. And I didn't notice any drones.
I'm not sure if there was a queen, but if there was she must have been on the first piece of comb I shook a cluster of bees off of into the top of the hive. Now this was another strange thing I had not seen in all the ones I have cut out of walls. The bees would go right down into the hive body. They usually wander around or fly around, but everytime I shook a bunch of bees off the comb, or brush them off, they would go right down into the hive. Now there was nothing in this hive. I had even forgotten to add foundation and/or starter strips. Nothing but new frames.
I didn't save any of the comb or honey as the area had been treated by the pest control people, even though they missed. The bees were entering this space from a hole somewhere lower down from where I cut out the wall. There was no way in up here.
I beevaced all the stragler I could. Then I got a spary bottle full of soappy water. As I picked up all the trash and collected my equipment I would spray anything that moved. Cut out and rolled up all the plastic sheets. Took down my frame. loaded up and was home by two AM.
Here is a hint if anyone decides to build this plastic holding pen. Next time I am going to install some screen in there somewhere. Man it got hot. I was dripping wet from hair to boot soles. Through all my clothes and bees suit. When I stepped out of the cage it felt like winter time in the airconditioned room.
African bees my a...... um armpit. I think these were the most docile bees I have dealt with yet. I was out this morning trying to get them out of the beevac and headed into the hive. When I opened them both up I had bees everywhere. Flying all over the place, trying to figure out where they were. Didn't have vail or gloves on. Some would look at me and then move on. Don't know why they attacked the lawn guy.
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Wonder if the yard man was running a weedeater or mower near by. My bees are pretty calm most of the time but come around the hives with a weedeater and they will come greet you. It must be the pitch of the motor and vibration it puts off or something.