Bees, friend or foe?

[treeslayer]

I started this response re: bug spray in another thread, But it probably belongs here. it was definitly life threatening.
I tried the "soapy water bottle" trick once when I encountered a beehive 30' up in a maple last summer.
It only pissed them off big time and after one particular cut they swarmed me bad.
I was roped, and tied off with lanyards, blocking with a Husky 372.
Luckily I remembered what an older climber told me years ago, DON'T FIGHT THE BEES! get out. At all costs.
It took everything I had to unhook, step off and rappel out.
(At 90 mph screaming!) My ground man ran in and unhooked me and I ran/dove/fell down the hill and into the house.
Tony, my groundman was stung 12 times, and I took over 50, mostly on the arms, neck and face.
I went to the urgent care, and got doped up, and it ended up costing me almost $300. They said I'm now impervious to bee venom or the next one will kill me.
I carry a large syringe of ephedrine they gave me just in case.
Tony went back that afternoon and sprayed hundreds of them.
I finished the tree the next day. this was my worst experience ever climbing.
The moral of this story, DON'T FIGHT THE BEES! Bless the groundmen that care.

 

[treeclimber165]

I do not know if it is still available, but a mild mix of malathion will knock them out of mid air and kill them instantly. I had a hollow oak removal over a house once, huge hive about 25' up. I went over about dusk one day and got on a big stepladder out in the yard with a hose-end sprayer. I removed the deflector so I had a straight stream out of the sprayer and shot it in the hole. Barely any bees got out, they just fell over. I went back a few days later and cut the tree down with no problems. The hive was over 12" across (inside the hollow) and almost 3 feet long, HUGE!

 

[treeslayer]

I found the pictures from this job.
This one was taken right about 15 minutes before I was swarmed.

 

[treeslayer]

And this one was taken the next day.
(real men always finish off the wounded.)
Thats Tony Gonzalez on the left. (066=36" bar)
groundman extraordinaire.

 

[blue]

we took a large sycamore down during the summer which had a large bee's nest in it.fortunatley when the boss looked at the job he forgot to take the owners phone number so had to go back to the house a few weeks later.only when he stood looking at the tree with the resident did he notice loads of bee's swarming around about 20' foot up the tree.boss man said to the resident about them to get the repley that he had been watching them all year(did'nt mention it when the job was priced probably did'nt think it was to important!!!!)we had the nest sprayed but climbing up the tree when we came to do it was real spooky(kept thinking i was seeing bee's for first hour.when it came to logging the trunk down we found the nest to bee about 12" across and nerly 36" down the trunk.i really don'nt like to think what would have happened if the boss was so forgetfull!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Wiley_P]

I have removed 2 trees with honeybee hives in them. I am guessing that you guys are referring to honeybees and not wasps or hornets. In some western states it is against the law to kill honeybee nests. I have a beekeeper here in Wa. come take the nests.Both times no charge, he was very happy to get more bees for his hives.I would catagorize bees as a very pissy freind.even the hornets have an important role in the urban ecosystem as very effcient predators.