A vacant house in Atlanta has been home to thousands of honeybees that were said to be terrorizing the nearby neighbors.
The beehive was finally removed, and the neighbors are glad to see it go. One neighbor who lived right next door said he was afraid the bees would sting him, so he never went past the house. He was afraid to leave his house at times.
According to that neighbor, the bees moved onto the empty property in the spring, and every day since then the hive has grown larger. At this stage, there were many different ‘pockets’ where the bees lived, both inside and outside, and bees swarmed around the entire garden and neighboring gardens as well.
We have not found any news to indicate the bees harmed anyone, so it is hard to know if the neighbor had a bad experience or was just afraid due to the thought of so many bees being in one location.
This 2:39-minute video by CBS46 Atlanta captures this story in video:
According to the Director of the Metro-Atlanta Beekeeper’s Association, Dave Marshall, it is strongly recommended in Georgia, just like in other US states, that honeybees are not killed because they are vital to human food supplies due to their pollination services. Bees have struggled to survive in many ways in recent years, mainly due to decisions made by humans. Bees are responsible for one of every three bites of food we have, and it is the healthy, fresh food as compared to the packaged or processed food. They also provide us with honey.
We must do the right thing for honeybees. That means getting experts to come to the scene of an out-of-control situation instead of taking matters into our own hands.
There is a reason for the phrase ‘busy bees.’ They waste no time in building their hives, making honey, raising their young and growing their numbers. It can all happen quickly, and that can be disturbing to some people.
This is all the more reason to educate people about bees. As we said in many blog posts, bees do not wish to sting people, and usually only do so if they fear their hive is threatened, except for Africanized killer bees which can be dangerous.
In this instance, the property owner hired a bee removal service to safely remove the bees from the property, and according to the concerned neighbor, around 98% of them are now gone.
Near the end of the video, it is sad to see the lost little bees down in the grass, not knowing where their home went. The hive they worked so hard to build is gone, their sister bees... gone, their queen bee... gone, their honey... gone.