Oh Beeeehiiiveee....

[Froggystyle]

First, it started with more bees than I knew what to do with when I was mowing my side yard. I had to have riled something up, so I am looking around and I see they are all kind of converging around the corner of my house. Upon closer inspection, I see that they are going in and out of a 1" hole in the bottom of an overhang that is otherwise stucco.
Now, before anyone goes and tells me about the bee shortage in California, or that people will come out and remove them or some crap like that... I know all about that now. Keep in mind, I was just coming off of my "Roof rat" problem and was in no mood for any more unauthorized residents.
I started by getting all geared up in my mosquito netting from back in the team guy days and taping up all openings. Then I climbed a ladder with three big cans of bee killer and started spraying. Holy shit! There was a lot more of them than I thought apparently.
After emptying two full cans in the hole, I stood back a little and just sprayed down the opening as the bees were emerging. No need to in retrospect, they were just coming out of the hole and diving straight down in a death spiral. It totally looked like a scene out of the Matrix where the sentinels breach the dome. Thousands of dead bees coming out of the hole and falling straight down. Creepy...
When they were done dying, and I was done spraying there was probably an 18" wide, 30" long and 6" deep pile of dead bees under the hole.
So, we call a pest guy, because clearly, we have a problem. He doesn't want anything to do with it since it is in the floors of the house, but he tells me to cut up the floor and find the hive.
Great. So, I move all of the equipment out of the gym, start pulling up carpet and I can just smell the honey already. Circ-saw goes to work, and I start cutting the floor out.
Short version, here is what I found. That piece of plywood those things are stuck to probably weighed 40 pounds or more.
http://www.***boat.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=32421&d=1181154447

[LAFD]

holy hell i bet thats some damn good honey right there. a shit load to.

[dunaholic]

Not good anymore, it has poison all over it.

[LAFD]

alittle poison ever hurt anyone.:D

[wolfie]

PETA will soon be giving you a call!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[SummitKarl]

DAMM Wes...looks like those Bees were using the "infusion method":D :D :D

[RiverDave]

F'in Bee Killa!!! :mad: :mad:
RD

[Froggystyle]

More pics...
http://www.***boat.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=32422&stc=1&d=1181155110
http://www.***boat.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=32423&stc=1&d=1181155220
The pest guy said I had to scrape all of it out, wash out any honey and then prime the wood and stucco otherwise they would be back.
So, I don't have any of the pics because I was up to my damn elbows in honey and honeycomb, but here is the trash can afterwards. Probably close to 100 pounds of dead bees and honey.
Scraping the bottom was the grossest thing... just piles of dead bees all stuck to the inch or so of honey on the ground. Since it had been a couple of weeks since I had killed the hive, lots of honey had dripped out of the comb.
As though all of that isn't creepy enough, about a million ants had decided to take this opportunity to dig in and get some. So, that pretty much doubled the gross factor altogether...
http://www.***boat.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=32424&stc=1&d=1181155600
The black things on the bottom of the pic are all dead bees in a sticky wad...
I probably am not going to be all that into honey for a long time... It actually started smelling gross pretty quickly. Too much of it, probably combined with Raid and ant killer.

[Ziggy]

Hey Boo Boo, lets find a pick-a-nick basket of honey...........But Yogi, you'll get stung.. :D:D
.
Gnarely Wes, I have a hive in the tree in front of my house too...nothing as substantial as that though..:eek:
.
I can't believe you never heard them buzzing in the room..

[Cigalert]

I found one of those gems in my garage at work. I found 3 gaps between studs from the floor to the firebreak filled front to back. After wearing some welding gloves, duct taping my pant legs and arms with a hoodie sweatshirt and a pool net for a bee mask I finally got rid of all of them....with the aid of a soldering torch and some WD-40.
2 years later it still smells like honey out there. Good luck getting rid of the honey stank.

[Froggystyle]

I found one of those gems in my garage at work. I found 3 gaps between studs from the floor to the firebreak filled front to back. After wearing some welding gloves, duct taping my pant legs and arms with a hoodie sweatshirt and a pool net for a bee mask I finally got rid of all of them....with the aid of a soldering torch and some WD-40.
2 years later it still smells like honey out there. Good luck getting rid of the honey stank.
Gone! I did it right by scraping it all out, washing it with degreaser and hot water then primed over it... here is what it looked like when I was done, but before primer.
http://www.***boat.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=32426&stc=1&d=1181156311
You can see the hole they were getting in from too... For some reason a previous occupant figured that drilling a hole through the floor and then out the bottom of the overhang was the right thing to do...
I don't know that a blowtorch and WD-40 would have even come to mind! :D

[riverbound]

that is actually pretty cool looking. glad you got rid of them all though.

[Froggystyle]

that is actually pretty cool looking. glad you got rid of them all though.
I was completely creeped out from the minute I pulled that board up. I had to psych myself up to do the job in fact...
The whole organized hive thing just grossed me out deluxe.

[Cigalert]

Hey Froggy, I used 1 gallon of degreaser, a scrub brush along with a heated pressure washer. Now that it's warming up the smell is coming back again. That crap just stains deep into everything.
Regarding the WD40, you got lucky and didn't have any bees. Mine still had the queen. 1 full day of playing bees I thought I was done. Went in the next day and starting checking everything out. That's when I heard a humming noise coming from the wall again. I walked closer only to find the bees got behind the paper that lined the outside wall, it was friggin nuts watching the paper move. Took a poke at the paper with a shovel and the lights went dim with all the bees inside the garage. That's when the torch came out. I made it without getting stung but fear enabled me to use the tools within reach.

[Boatcop]

See Wes.
I told you that SEAL training would come in handy someday.

[LAFD]

had a bee problem in a block wall i filled the wall with gas a lite it. funny watching bees on fire trying to fly looked like fire flys. haha.

[riverbound]

I was completely creeped out from the minute I pulled that board up. I had to psych myself up to do the job in fact...
The whole organized hive thing just grossed me out deluxe.
Yah its amazing to see how that thing is alyedout perfectly and in such a small space. That Honey would have been good without the poison.

[SB]

See Wes.
I told you that SEAL training would come in handy someday.
Hey Froggy, are Bee-killers born or made? :D
To bad you can't use bees for fiberglass. Maybe with a little DNA adjustment, bees could build boats. Hey that's a great movie idea, none of you fokkers better steal it. :D

[SB]

See Wes.
I told you that SEAL training would come in handy someday.
Hey Froggy, are Bee-killers born or made? :D
To bad you can't use bees for fiberglass. Maybe with a little DNA adjustment, bees could build boats. Hey that's a great movie idea, none of you fokkers better steal it. :D

[uvindex]

See Wes.
I told you that SEAL training would come in handy someday.That's only if he had killed each bee individually in hand-to-hand combat. :D

[Legal Chemistry]

To bad you can't use bees for fiberglass. Maybe with a little DNA adjustment, bees could build boats. Hey that's a great movie idea, none of you fokkers better steal it. :D
How do you know they aren't illegals???
PAPERS? We don't need no stinkin' papers!

[Liberator TJ1984]

shoulda just put in a small trap door :rolleyes: all the free honey you would have wanted :D

[Froggystyle]

That Honey would have been good without the poison.
As luck would have it, you can buy honey very inexpensively at Von's. One little jar will last a long time too.
If I had cows rumbling around in my subfloor, the last thing on my mind would have been "free beef"... ;)

[Froggystyle]

Purely out of curiosity, how would you harvest the actual honey? Seems like it was kind of trapped in the cells of the comb...
That, and protected till death by thousands of bees...

[riverbound]

As luck would have it, you can buy honey very inexpensively at Von's. One little jar will last a long time too.
If I had cows rumbling around in my subfloor, the last thing on my mind would have been "free beef"... ;)
Purely out of curiosity, how would you harvest the actual honey? Seems like it was kind of trapped in the cells of the comb...
That, and protected till death by thousands of bees...
Wes, I always saw you as an optimist....quit clogging up this thread with those things called facts ;)
although the thought of you being chased around your yard by thousands of pissed off bees does bring a smie to my face :D

[rrrr]

Hey Froggy, they weren't those killer South American bees, were they?
:D
http://www.simpsonstrivia.com.ar/simpsons-photos/wallpapers/bumble-bee-man.gif

[DMOORE]

Damn that hive was massive. Wonder how long they have been there in order to build that.
Darrell.

[Froggystyle]

Wes, I always saw you as an optimist....quit clogging up this thread with those things called facts ;)
although the thought of you being chased around your yard by thousands of pissed off bees does bring a smie to my face :D
Fortunately, I never really did get chased per se... All the ones surrounding my head during the killing were on their way out...
What would have brought a smile to your face was the wave of nausea that must have crossed mine when I first pulled that floor up. Kind of a combination of awe, disgust, wonder and curiosity all rolled up in one. Once the smell of the clover honey combined with Raid hit me... I had to open a window.
Then the reality of thousands of squatters, carefully organized set in.

[Froggystyle]

Damn that hive was massive. Wonder how long they have been there in order to build that.
Darrell.
They say that they can produce a pound of honey per day once they are up and running... From the looks of things, I believe it.

[Schiada76]

I just got a swarm out of the master bedroom, we're remodeling and they got in through a hole in the ceiling.
Shop Vac worked great!:D

[EmpirE231]

I had a huge hive in a tree in my back yard.... a lil carb spray and a lighter took care of that reallll quick though :D

[zudnic]

I have a commercial orchard, every year we have a bee guy leave hive boxes in our orchards. It sucks that we need them to pollinate, get the same problem with older farm houses, and other buildings on the property. It's very hard to rid the smell, etc.

[CARLSON-JET]

Purely out of curiosity, how would you harvest the actual honey? Seems like it was kind of trapped in the cells of the comb...
That, and protected till death by thousands of bees...
Centrifuge (sp) heat and a strainer. wild honey is about triple the cost of commercial honey.. clover and Buckwheat is really big in that area. Harbison canyon is loaded with great producing hives.
B T W... nice pun

[Froggystyle]

Centrifuge (sp) heat and a strainer. wild honey is about triple the cost of commercial honey.. clover and Buckwheat is really big in that area. Harbison canyon is loaded with great producing hives.
B T W... nice pun
Wasn't sure anyone would get that... :D Almost put it in quotes actually... ;)

[RiverDave]

Wasn't sure anyone would get that... :D Almost put it in quotes actually... ;)
I must've missed it, becuase I've read it twice now and still don't see it?
RD

[DILLIGAF]

DAMN! That is pretty wild Wes.

[Froggystyle]

I must've missed it, becuase I've read it twice now and still don't see it?
RD
You'll get it... I have confidence.
Imagine part of it with "so to speak" after it...

[OCMerrill]

That must have been one hell of a buzz under the floor.
So now comes the issue of the floor rebuild?
Being a boat guy and all are you going to glass in a patch of marine grade plywood? :D :D
We fix up this stuff all the time. Bees always go for the the 2nd story. Bee guys usually just knock a hole in the stucco, spray them out, smoke them down, and remove the hive. Then we get the w/o to restore the stucco. Usually up 30' high on a ladder. PITA.
Yours was a better fix and less work.
And I don't think bee removal guys care to much about honey either. Kind of usless after all the poison spray used.
I do understand the combs are pressed and then the leftover wax is processed and used also. Just not in th case of homeowner hives.

[Havasu Hangin']

I just went through this...they nested in an inaccessable area of the attic. I called a bee exterminator, and it cost me $255 to get rid of them.

[2Driver]

Col pics Are you allowed to ill them in California?:D
Wonder how long it took them to get it that far?

[Legal Chemistry]

I wonder if these are out and about in SD... I had a *very* small colony about a month or so ago trying to start up under an eve.... I think I got lucky and caught it right away! That hive is scary... I've never been bit and don't want to find now if I'm allergic.

[Infomaniac]

Sell that honey to China. They don't have a problem sending contaminated food to us.

[Sherpa]

I found a 40 pound hive in a wall (it was not active at the time) when I
replaced my old power panel with a 200 amp unit...... those little buggers
work pretty well....... they had the entire wall cavity filled between studs
from the roof ridge to about 3 feet from the floor.......
thank God no bees were in it....... and the honey tasted GREAT.....
--Sherpa

[Gizmo]

when we was younger me an ma frend would get sticks and smack bees like tiny baseballs. A nest was there and they com after us runnin like scared girls. just lue get stinged one time