OK, so this may not be something you ever really need to do, but let me tell you, when you need one, it's really handy if their kids are friends with your kids and she'll run right over and take care of things. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
My daughter and I spent a good deal of this glorious day outside. We planted a few things, watered a few things, and did some reading in the grass. We retired inside to contemplate dinner. About an hour later I went outside and found this:
That is my mailbox. With a beard of bees. They all arrived in the hour we were in the house. Amazing.Fortunately, the mail had already come, so I didn't need to disturb them to find all of the fascinating sales fliers my mailman brought me.
Enter the Bee Wrangler. I haven't known Jennifer long, but our kids are friends. I called her up and she be-bopped right over.
Can I just say, "Wow." I have never seen this process. I am bee phobic enough to be more than a little freaked out at the thought of being in a little net tent with hundreds of bees, even with the protective gear. But Jennifer is brave. Jennifer is experienced. Jennifer went right to work.
She has this cute little bee box that she hooks up to a Shop Vac looking thing. She gently sucks them up and they land into their temporary home. When she gets to the queen in the middle of all the bees, she unhooks the vacuum and holds the house in her lap. She then gets the queen on her finger and puts her in the box being careful not injure her.
The process isn't quite complete yet. She left that little box leaning up against the mailbox. There were quite a few bees that were still airborne and didn't make it into the box. She said they will land there and then quit flying after dark. She will come back by and just pick it up and take them home. She will relocate to them a new hive tomorrow.I now know more about bee habits than I ever dreamed. It really is fascinating. But I'll leave the bee wrangling to Jennifer. I'll stick to my safe spot on the porch. : )
7 comments:
This is quite intersting! I'm with you on the staying on the porch part.
FASCINATING!! I've always wanted to be a bee keeper and have my own hives.
wow that's fantastic!
I remember when this happened to us last year. We didn't get to witness this part, because for some unknown reason they all left when the wrangler went to get his stuff.
Thank you for the pics, this was interesting to see. :-)
Wow, this is really cool! Thanks for the neat series of photos so we could see what a bee wrangler does.
That is SOOO neat. I wish I had been there!
How interesting! Thanks for sharing it with us.
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