I had a terrible morning yesterday. Will gently woke me with a sound slumber to say “I think a bear attacked your hive”. Ugh. He actually offered to try and put it back together because “he was worried the bees would freeze”. My husband really is a cracker jack guy. After his words had sunk in, I sprang out of bed, threw on shoes and a coat and went straight outside to inspect.
The entire hive had been dumped on its side and several frames had been torn from the hive and were missing comb. I was half asleep still and started picking up the frames without thinking that the bees might not be in a good mood. Bad move. The angry bees swarmed me and I ran from the hive. I got stung once. Muttering to myself I went back in to get into my suit (which does not include pants), jeans, socks and gloves. No time for the smoker; it really was cold and I did not think it would help. In my gear I proceeded to pick up the hive and add frames back in. I have never seen bees this angry (rightfully so). I hurriedly reassembled the hive as hundreds of bees proceeded to attack me. Here’s something I hadn’t considered – women’s stretch jeans do not appear to be impervious to stings. Denim is pretty thick, but stretch denim really isn’t. I got stung about 3 more times before I ran to the front yard to try and brush myself off.
I didn’t want to come inside with angry bees all over my suit, but I didn’t want to take my suit off with angry bees all over me so I rang the doorbell waiting for Will. Apparently Will was in the shower and couldn’t hear me so eventually I unzipped my suit and ran inside. I think I managed to leave the bees outside.
So this was a total disaster. I can’t believe that the first time in 3 years that I have a good queen my hive is attacked by a large animal. Now I have multiple things to consider. Is the queen still alive? I really have no idea. The bees were so frenzied that I definitely did not have time to inspect. Will the bear come back? I assume the answer to this is a resounding yes which leads me to my final question. How do I protect my hive?
Noooooo! The poor bees!
This sent me down an unexpected Google hole. Let us know of you need help building something to protect them!
Haha Thank you for the offer!!
How heart breaking! We live in TX so no bears, but last year my “Happy Hippy Hive” that had 20 deep frames of bees, brood & honey was decimated by wax moths :-( I don’t know if our queen died, left, was weak or what – but one week everyone was fine & 2 weeks later it was like bee holocaust. I was so upset. I was hoping the few remaining bees would make nice with our neighboring hive & find a new home (maybe – they were doomed anyway).
Apparently for wax moths you are supposed to freeze the frames to kill the larve – I was so pissed off, I set my frames next to a mound of fire ants! The only time I’ve been happy about having fire ants around!
Oh my gosh! Wax moths!! I am so sorry! My hives haven’t lived long enough in the past few years to fall prey to pests! Setting the frames infected by wax moths next to a fire ant colony is hilarious. I hope they took care of those jerks!