Watch out for bees

jdtuttle · September 11, 2009, 10:36:35 PM

I've been stung many times before but never had a reaction to it until yesterday. I was at my brothers helping him push his 49 international pickup in the garage to work on the gas tank. Well we stopped for a rest & I rested my elbow on the tailgate. I felt a little sting & realized my elbow was in a bees nest & there were about 15 bees on me. >:( I started flapping & jumping around & my brothers were laughing thinking I was goofing around. :D We got the truck in and sat down for a well deserved beer. 8) About 5 minutes later my feet started itching, then my scalp, then I had hives all over & my upper lip started to swell. >:( Well I have to say it's the first time I didn't finish a beer ;) I had my brother take me to the hospital & they fixed me up 8). The morale of the story is watch where you put your arm & don't mess with bees. Never knew I was allergic but it may just be the # of stings. Dang little buggers

SPIKER · September 12, 2009, 11:23:07 AM

Them bees seem to have gotten more potent! this past 3 weeks been stung 2 different times! by yellow jackets. 1 sting in face eye/cheek area, and 5 on elbows, different times / spots, the elbow stings itch & burn bad for over a week!(why do they always go for eyes, elbows & lips!???

mark

Radar67 · September 12, 2009, 12:28:13 PM

I have an allergy to bees, but the last one that stung me had no effect, other than hurting (got me on the chin). I wonder if it had something to do with my adrenaline level? I was getting my wife away from a disturbed hive and they were getting matted in her hair. My only thought was to get them out by beating her with my hat. ;) It worked too, not a one of them survived, she however, got stung about 12 times.

CJennings · September 12, 2009, 03:37:42 PM

I don't believe I'm allergic, I've never had a reaction other than it was painful, but you can become allergic so the next sting may cause a reaction, it may not. Yellowjackets are the worst. They're aggressive. Honeybees aren't bad, they usually leave you alone (unless you're in the SW with the killers). I had to walk through a meadow full of wildflowers covered in honeybees a couple weeks ago. You could hear the hum 100 feet away. Not a problem. Go near yellowjackets like that though, and it won't end well...

nas · September 12, 2009, 08:35:39 PM

I hope it wasn't the beer

pasbuild · September 12, 2009, 08:45:10 PM

Quote from: nas on September 12, 2009, 08:35:39 PM
I hope it wasn't the beer

:D :D :D

SwampDonkey · September 12, 2009, 08:47:26 PM

They're hold up in the top of my flue, yup actual honey bees. Been smoking the buzzards out with a small smudge. Someone forgot to tell them the difference between a hollow tree and a furnace flue. They're being educated tonight. ;D

jdtuttle · September 13, 2009, 08:21:25 AM

I hope it wasn't the beer
Nope, it wasn't the beer. I had one last nihght & no side affects. I think :D

Chuck White · September 13, 2009, 09:07:28 AM

I've had bees working the sawdust pile as I was sawing lumber!
Of course there were scouts buzzing around the mill too and they would try out every nook and cranny they could spot.
I ended up putting a piece of tape over the hole in the main beam where the operators seat would be anchored while in transport! Don't know what was so special about that spot, but the tape did the trick and it's still there! ;D

My oldest son is alergic to bees and being in the military, he carries a syringe with him!

nas · September 13, 2009, 01:21:50 PM

Quote from: jdtuttle on September 13, 2009, 08:21:25 AM
I hope it wasn't the beer
Nope, it wasn't the beer. I had one last nihght & no side affects. I think :D

Judging by your spelling, maybe there were some side effects

Lud · September 16, 2009, 06:40:07 AM

Sevin powder. Best to put it where the bees will walk thru it and carry into hive.

I took a ten foot piece of 3/4" CPVC , lightly plugged with a kleenex, jammed that end in the Sevin and I had a one shot blowgun that wiped out a swarm in a walnut tree by the mailbox in a few days. 8)

bossltr · September 16, 2009, 07:21:29 AM

Pesticides for honey bees? Seems sad, and wasteful.
Try and find a local bee keeper, many wild swarms and hives are very good and often healthier bees than the commercial bee keepers have. Brian

SwampDonkey · September 17, 2009, 04:12:49 AM

I had to remove a bunch Monday from the flue. Had about 14" x 6" x 5" sized honeycomb. Had to smoke them out for a couple days. It was near the top of the flue, over 40 feet up from the basement. I have no idea where they came from, no one has any hives around here. I never saved the comb, the skunks need a treat I suppose. :

JJ · September 19, 2009, 11:17:04 AM

I got stung by white faced hornet on the for arm several years ago.
My arm slowly swelled up over course of several days, until it looked like popeye's arm, and weighed 2-3x normal.

Never was painful, but once it got to the size it was uncomfortable to move around, I went to doctor.

Doctor took one look and sent me home to get benadryl (alergy medicne).
I take one pill, and 1/2 or 1 hour later, my arm was normal size.

JJ

Dave Shepard · September 19, 2009, 12:00:04 PM

I've never had a reaction to them either, until a couple of weeks ago. I got stung about ten times, and five of those on my right hand. Swelled up so I couldn't close it. I found the first nest in the sawdust next to the mill. I was weed wacking and sawed the top of it off. :

I moved to another location and got hit again. >:( Gave up and went to another of our properties and got stung there too. Hand was really swelled up by then, went home. Next day I ran over the sawdust pile with the payloader. 8)

I'm sawing out a timber frame for a friend and I stopped in to see how the logging was going earlier in the week, he had dropped two bee trees, unknowingly. The first was a honey bee tree, and he got one sting, the second was yellow jackets. They are going up there with a hive this weekend to see if they move in.

SwampDonkey · September 19, 2009, 05:30:56 PM

I struck 3 nests of hornets this summer when brushing. One was in a hollow spruce tree where they were coming and going from a hole the size of your finger. Sometimes you can work right by a nest and they will not even touch you. Come back again, like the next day, and they will not be so easy on ya. ;D :D

A couple years ago we were on a block and they were all over the place with football sized nests and it was real thick brush. Like being blind folded and hitting the piñata for your prize.

rebocardo · September 20, 2009, 06:46:41 AM

> I've been stung many times before

I think it is like poison ivy, if you are allergic, the effects build up over time until you have the crisis condition and a full reaction.

Dave Shepard · September 20, 2009, 08:31:47 AM

That is true. This last time I got stung was the first I've ever had that much swelling, i.e. other than just in the immediate bite area. That could have been due to the number of stings, however.

Don K · September 20, 2009, 08:00:31 PM

I've always had a allergy to them. Concerning honeybees, if I saw 12 over the course of the summer that was about all. All my pollinating in the garden was by bumble bees. If they decline we will be in sad shape.

Don

isawlogs · September 20, 2009, 09:10:30 PM

I was cutting the edge of the fields the other day with a sickle bar mower and cut a bees nest in two ... Man that aint a way to end a day ... They was some upset , I was ok , did not get stung once , but my stoopid dog went in ta investagate what was all the humming about , :

Poor little Charlie , she run the length of the field and then rode the bike home. All the way and even now , she wont stand a fly hoovering above her . :D

I saw this nest hanging above the river, first time I ever seen one above water .

I know ya cant see much on this one , but its there , in the middle /center of the pic ... A little white dot on the tree trunk .

For those that cant see it , here is a close up , it is one this size that I cut in two and that Charlie investigated ....( it is the size of a basketball .) :-\

ouachita · September 20, 2009, 09:32:53 PM

I assume that you guys know about aloe vera. I keep a plant growing at the house as a general medicinal. Great for stings and burns. Break off a leaf, cut the leaf in half lengtwise and smear the clear gel on the sting/burn.

Charles Westmoreland CF
"Ouachita"
Jessieville, Arkansas

SwampDonkey · September 21, 2009, 04:25:57 AM

Jewel weed or spotted touch-me-not is an antidote to nettle stings and relief of poison ivy rash, I wonder if it works on bee stings. It has a juicy succulent stock found in wet places. I was out picking butternuts yesterday, and if you know the plant, touching the ripe seed pod causes it to launch it's seed from the pod by a built in hair trigger. ;D

Banjo picker · September 21, 2009, 08:57:44 AM

Marcel thats what folks down here call a hornets nest...much worse than bees if they get you...I 've never been stung by a hornet...plenty by bees ,wasp and yellow jackets....

The other day I had skidded a big white oak out of the woods and later the wife & I went back there on the RTV and the yellow jackets got us both...she got the worst of it...and they were the smallest little jackets I had ever seen....but they were plenty mad...Tim

Engineer · September 21, 2009, 10:31:57 AM

I spent a couple hours yesterday waist deep in a raspberry patch, and there were dozens of bees all over the berry bushes. They ignored me completely. I haven't been stung since I was a little kid. I will leave honeybees alone, but hornets and yellowjackets get the Raid.