Angry Bees!
grdad45
Member Posts: 5,381 ✭✭✭✭
While I was out taking a morning stroll, my neighbor was mowing along the side of our road with his zero turn. Just as I was meeting him, the bee colony he mowed past decided to get angry. First sting I got was on the back of my head, then my ring finger and inside my elbow. If you think a fat, old, man with two knee replacements can't run, you should have seen me! The neighbor got swarmed, too, and followed me into our kitchen, got stung 5 or 6 times. Two of the little devils got in with us, but we used a fly swatter on them.
That colony has never been aggressive before, but I think he just got too close to their hollow tree.
I am slightly allergic to stings, and keep Benadryl on hand. We are going to wait until they settle down to retrieve the mower and my hat and walking staff that I lost on the way up the hill.
I have to mow pretty close (across the 25' wide road) to them. Hoping we don't become enemies, I will win that skirmish.
Comments
Ouch !!!!.....we have a large colony in a tree in our front yard. They are so loud you can hear them sitting on the porch 50 feet away....I am allergic to bee venom so I have to be careful when it comes to bees.. I do not mow that part of the yard nor around the outbuildings during the late spring and summer....My bride takes care of those areas....
I hope they haven't been taken over by those killer Afrikanized bees. In the southwest the killer bees kill the honey bee queens and replace them with their own and take over the hive.😵 Bob
I was working an outdoor light a couple of weeks ago and found out the hard way that there was a nest of Japanese hornets,or thats what we called them in the south,under the eve.They look like yellow jackets nearly the size of your thumb.Just got stung once above the ear.Felt like a strong spring clamp on my ear for a couple of days.
Sorry to hear this be careful...so far on my place the worst is fire ants and you don't want to actually stand on their mound without knowing it....
Update--had a delayed reaction to the antibiotic I was prescribed. My face and throat swelled up overnight, several days after the bee attack. Went back to DR., and was prescribed a "dose pack" and Epi-pen. The Epi-pen can be a life saver if someone is allergic to venom or other stuff, causing Anaphylaxis.
VERY IMPORTANT!!!!! If you have Epi-pens make SURE those around you know how to administer it! I instructed my Wife on the use, and will pass it on to my hunting club. They or you may rescue another person.
....Sorry to hear...I hate getting stung...as a kid I got stung regularly...😊
...I was about 10 years old and playing catch one evening, the ball went into a bush...I parted the bush to look...ZAP! ZAP ZAP! ZAP! I didnt find the ball but I found a Yellow Jacket nest...5-6 stung t my face...I looked like some lumpy face creature for a couple of days...😁
...The absolute worst sting I got was a Bumble Bee I steeped on barefoot, stung me between my toes 😮...
Go out there at night...find there underground bunker.. entrance and back door. Take some of those insect bombs for indoors and stuff it in their doors. Gas em'
...When I come across a bothersome nest I gas 'em alright, but like we do to get rattlesnakes out of a den or rock crevice...hose, funnel in hose, then pour a tad of gasoline in, then blow...except this time I put in the gas then burned the little devils...all gone...😉
I don't stand on the mound if I know it! Don
Two weeks ago I was talking to my neighbor across our fence. Turned around to leave and was face-to-face with a bald-faced hornet nest attached to my outside electrical panel. Didn't get stung, and backed away VERY slowly.
I planned to go out there at about 4 a.m. in a rain jacket, gloves, and face shield to spray them. Then weighed discretion versus valor and called a professional.
Man came out in a bee suit and gloves, and sprayed them. Interwebnet says bald-faced hornets are extremely aggressive and dangerous, capable of multiple stings each. Best $130 I've spent this year.
Absolute worst stinging I ever got, I was helping my great uncle Jake get up baled hay. Jumped off wagon in Louisa County, Virginia and landed on their mound on ground. They seem to like building in red clay soil and leave a mound about 3" in diameter about 1" high. They are at least three times the size of a regular wasp and are very dark oxford brown color. Three of them got me at top of low quarter work boot. In half hour had to cut rawhide laces off to get boot off the foot because it was swollen so bad. First was shooting pain then throbbing pain for almost two days, Never went to doctor because Grandpa raised honey bee's and I had been stung so many times, I think I was almost immune to them. Even yellow jackets don't bother me that much. But those ground wasp are EVIL.-----------------------------Ray
1st thing I think of any time angry bees is mentioned
sorry to hear and if you allergic that's bad news for sure hope you can work out living arrangements with them
my worst two bee encounters ( been stung many times mostly my fault ) once we came home from shopping, we had left a window open there were thousands of honey bees they had swarmed and had picked our bed room . funny I did not get stung even while walking around in the room . I closed the door and windows went back in town got a couple bug bombs set them off in a hour or so the room and every thing in was carpeted with honey bees
I use to go out with a plastic bat ( like a kids whiffle bat ? ) and "fight "with the bumble bees that always had a nest going on behind the barn . just for the fun of it, then one day my wife walked up close started distracted me saying something and well long enough they ( bees ) got a clear shot at me so I gut stung a few time's no fun in Mudvill that evening . so out came the gas can and no more bating practice .
I killed bees and wasps for the fun of it when I was a kid.
Now days, I live and let live.
We don't have the killer African( whatever kind), and no one in my immediate family or people who visit are allergic. If they were, it'd be a different story.
Have a couple gates that no one is allowed to open except for myself or farmer buddies. Old, rusted, holey gates that wasps live in.
God put them here for a reason. I don't question why, and the bees, wasps and I have an agreement.
I am not allergic to bee stings. But they still hurt like hell and I get a lot of swelling etc. I have learned that tobacco will just knock out a bee sting. If you get stung, get some chewing tobacco, or part of a Marlboro, any tobacco. Just a pinch the size of a .38 slug. Moisten it and put it on the sting. In 40 seconds it all just goes away.
I believe that tobacco neutralizes bee sting venom. I would be interested to learn if this would work with a person who is allergic and I believe it would. I can't test it on myself as I am not allergic.
have a bee man evaluate i had some hives that went bad the devil himself lived in them i never had problem running mower under the fronts or weedwacking till the evil came ,one pee ode guard bee and they came with heck fire
Now them poultices be laced with feathermoss and mustard root. Mind you drop water on 'em occasional and keep 'em damp.
We had a mean swarm of 'wild' honey bees living in a hollow tree along the driveway through our hay field. They would come right out and chase the tractors even though we didn't bother them. After the second summer of that unsociable attitude, I started giving them a 1/2 a pop can dose of gasoline about 3 mornings per week. I'd go out early when it was still cool and sneak up close enough to dump the 5-6 ounces of gas in the hollow of the tree and then take off. I know the gas was killing a butt load of them with each dose but it still took 3 weeks to get rid of them.
Allen, Grandpa would always reach for his pouch of Red Man in his bib coveralls if i got stung. Usually he already had a mouth full and fresh needed to be chewed first and a wad placed on sting site. He would get me to hold it in place.
If he did not have the tobacco handy he would look for a red clay mud hole and scoop up a hand full to place on sting site. That seemed to work good also.------------------Ray
I have been stung countless times in my life by just about every type of bee there is around here. Lucky not to have allergies. The worst experience besides the multiple hits at once was when a yellow jacket nailed me right in the tight skin of my forehead while driving down the road in the car.
That sting gave me a headache that lasted several days!
Growing up we had a creek\crick in the back yard and a dab of the sandy mud from that crick placed on a sting took away the pain in seconds.