Friday, July 18, 2008
My bee story
So John came back again to repair the broken downspout drain on the balcony.
He began opening up the wall. Immediately, bees began flying out. Obviously they were not gone yet. Luckily they are not aggressive. They just fly around and make me nervous. Once the wall was open we got the idea to use my camera to take a picture up inside the wall to see what we had. Here is that picture.
Yikes! We definitely need a bee removal expert.
When the bee guy came he explained that he needed to get the queen and then the other bees would follow. The next picture is him breaking the wall open. Even when he pounded on their wall they didn't attack. They just flew around.
Once the wall was open we could see the honeycomb on the upper right side.
Next, he used a metal scooper to put the bees into a box. Then he carefully inspected the swarming bees to find the queen. Unfortunately she was nowhere to be found. Either she flew away or was killed during the demolition. In this case he took the bees that were in the box and then sprayed the whole area with something that would cause the remaining bees to go away. So, no more bees but a very interesting afternoon.
He began opening up the wall. Immediately, bees began flying out. Obviously they were not gone yet. Luckily they are not aggressive. They just fly around and make me nervous. Once the wall was open we got the idea to use my camera to take a picture up inside the wall to see what we had. Here is that picture.
Yikes! We definitely need a bee removal expert.
When the bee guy came he explained that he needed to get the queen and then the other bees would follow. The next picture is him breaking the wall open. Even when he pounded on their wall they didn't attack. They just flew around.
Once the wall was open we could see the honeycomb on the upper right side.
Next, he used a metal scooper to put the bees into a box. Then he carefully inspected the swarming bees to find the queen. Unfortunately she was nowhere to be found. Either she flew away or was killed during the demolition. In this case he took the bees that were in the box and then sprayed the whole area with something that would cause the remaining bees to go away. So, no more bees but a very interesting afternoon.
Monday, July 14, 2008
Bees!!!
On the 4th of July I looked out my window and saw an enormous swarm of bees flying above my street. For a little while they were near my balcony but they eventually moved on.
I didn't notice them after that. On July 9 we went to Portland for a long weekend birthday celebration (which was great, btw)
When we returned today I noticed bees on the balcony again. Only this time they seemed to be going and coming from the drain hole near the balcony floor. There were enough bees flying around to make me nervous about inspecting too closely but I had the idea of flooding the floor with water so it would drain out of the hole and wash the bees away.
Now I've tried it and it may have helped a bit but it didn't solve the problem. I am afraid the there is a queen inside the framework of the balcony which means that it will take quite a bit more to persuade them to leave.
My most recent attempt has been to soak a rag with carpet cleaner (I had a jug of it nearby) and stuff the rag in the hole. My thinking was that the soap would be offensive and drive the bees away. I don't really want to kill them but I certainly don't want an infested balcony!
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