Queen Bee Lands

10-15,000 bees landed in our yard Saturday! Yes, I did mean to write thousands!
I unfortunately was not around to witness the phenomenon of the honeybees, but Drew handled it with flying bees colors! I was taking my last real estate class up when he sent me a text telling me we had bees. I think he eventually said there were probably hundreds. I, on the other hand, imagined 20 or so buzzing around a bush. In that case, when he said he called a bee keeper I thought he was being a bit extreme. Not to mention I wondered how he even thought to call a bee keeper, much less get a hold of one. Then, these pictures started showing up on my phone:

Holy cow! I practically gasped out loud in class! These pictures don't even do it justice. I saw some other pictures on his phone that he didn't send me which are even more clear and astonishing. The whole situation was crazy. As I mentioned, I originally thought he was over exaggerating and when he asked what to do I told him to bomb the bees with some spray we had from last summer. Thank heavens he was smarter than that and didn't bomb the bees. The bees would have been pi$$ed off and probably stung him to death. Instead, the bee keeper came and shook them off the tree into the box and took them home in his station wagon. Yes, he took them home in his car. 

The whole situation has turned into an educational experience. The bee keeper explained it like this... the queen bee happened to land on our branch so ALL 10-15,000 bees followed her. This happens between 10am and 2pm. Drew noticed the bees around 1:30. While the queen waits, a few 'scout' bees fly around looking for the bee's permanent home. That's what was happening in our backyard. The bees were waiting to hear where the permanent home was going to be, which is where they would start making honey. We, of course, did/do not want that permanent home in our backyard so close to our house and Lexi. According to some of the information we found, honeybees love to live in houses. We had no qualms about giving up our swarm of bees to the bee keeper, especially since it only takes the bees 24 to 48 hours to find their home. We needed to act fast. I am happy to say that the bee keeper was able to show up Saturday and take the bees away. Of course, it took me until yesterday (Monday) to actually cut the grass in the back yard near that tree. Even after we had some rain I was still nervous to go near the tree. I made no effort to actually walk under that tree to get the grass like I had done in the past.
The funny thing about the whole situation is that if it were the other way around, Drew would never have believed me either if I said there were hundreds of bees outside. He would have responded the exact same way, telling me to just spray them. I just can't say that I would have been thoughtful enough (ok "smart enough") to call a bee keeper. I would have probably freaked out and locked myself inside.
Thankfully, no one got hurt/stung in any of the process above.