Bees revisited

Howdy,

Welcome to my Dubai based container vegetable gardening blog.

I recieved a comment on one of my earlier blogs about bees - http://thedxbgardener.blogspot.com/2011/03/where-are-honey-bees.html

The person has some bees which have decided to make their home in their garden.  They were wondering what to do to remove them.  My question is why do you want to get rid of them?  Is it an unfounded fear you might have of bees just because they have stingers?  As I mentioned in my reply to the comment, if you have young children then it is a prudent decision to have the bees removed.  However, if the family is mature enough to point out the danger to them that playing with or aggravating the bees will result in pain then the family and the bees should be able to live together.

I DO NOT advocate killing bees but .....

If you really have to remove the bees because of an allergy to bees stings or you have small children that may get into the bees then please find some way to do it without killing them.  I am not sure what Dubai Municipality might be able to do for you but give them a call.

Do you know the differents between wasps, hornets and bees?  Wasps and hornets are nasty aggressive creatures that you need to get rid of if you find them in your garden.  Bees on the otherhand will usually leave you alone if you leave them alone.  If one comes flying around you just stand still and they will eventually see you do not have any pollen and leave.  Or just calmly take a couple of steps away and you will be alright - unless it is your perfume they like.  DO NOT start wildly swing your arms in all directions to scare it off - you just might hit it then you do have a problem!!!

Here are some videos for You Tube with some susgestions about removal of bees:



or if you have the right equipment and brave enough try this

Just a couple of pointers if you decide to do it yourself.  I do not care how macho you might think you are the bees will kick your butt in the end if you do not dress properly.  And the other most important thing is your smoker - smoke subdues the bees - if you run out of smoke you will have a bunch of bees after you!  I had seen it happen to my grandpa & his buddy.  They finally dropped everything and headed for the truck!!!  Some use cigar smoke but each time you lift your face netting to blow the smoke ......

Hope this was helpful to some.  If anybody had this problem here in Dubai or Emirates and can share with us what they did it might be helpful to others.

Thanks for stopping by!

Bubba