Posted on 05/27/2016 10:37:02 PM PDT by BenLurkin
A 23-year-old man died Thursday after being swarmed by bees and stung 1,000 times while hiking in Usery Mountain Park in Arizona, authorities said.
Alex Bestler and a friend were on the Merkle Trail when a large swarm of bees descended on them “without provocation or warning” shortly before 9 a.m., according to a Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office news release.
The victim’s friend — identified only as Sonya — managed to escape by seeking shelter in a restroom, but Bestler was overcome by the swarm, the release stated.
He was lying on the ground covered in bees when Sonya returned a short time later with an unidentified good Samaritan, according to the Sheriff’s Office. They were unable to approach Bestler “due to the aggressiveness of the bees,” but flagged down help.
It took three attempts for park employees and first responders to load him onto a park utility vehicle and transport him away from the scene, authorities said, noting bees continued to cover the victim’s body while the swarm pursued them.
(Excerpt) Read more at ktla.com ...
What is it about Africans that is always tied to violence. Even the bees.
Advanced bee keepers try to re=queen an African hive to to try to keep them. The aggressiveness (10X) is related to the bees general lifestyle. They will sting you in organized fashion until and after you die. They also gather and produce staggering amounts of honey. $$$$$
I re-load my own rifle and pistol ammunition. 38spl, 357 Mag, .45ACP, 30-06. An I am proficient enough at it not to have killed myself yet playing with and having fun with explosives. I do not tinker with C-4, nitroglygerin, or Mercury Fulminate.
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Still looking for a bee-Feeper ping list for FR. Spring time has hit and the ladies are coming and going with purpose.
All we ever here about is killer bees and their attacks while we sip our coffee sweetened by honey. Just as Chicago and the hoodlums grab all the news coverage, so to is it with the bees. Its the bad element that gets reported about and thats what forms every ones stereotypes about them.
Lots of details in this article, poor guy was allergic to bees?!
If he was allergic, it didnt take 100 stings from africanized bees to kill him. One or two stings from the most gentle bee is all it takes.
Bees don’t like dark and furry. Looks like a raiding animal .beekeepers wear white.
Never a campus safe zone around when you need one. Microagressed to death by bees.
Yes! You’re right.
(Classic movie buff here..love them)
It is very difficult to guard oneself against ALL dangers. We hear of incidents like this because they are news-worthy, yet standing on the sidewalk and getting hit by an errant car or in your living room and killed by a drive-by shooter get so much less news attention.
Always be ready for Death but never allow that to keep you from enjoying LIFE!
Last year I was helping a good friend disassemble a log home built in 1870. I disturbed a bee’s nest near a window opening. We knew they were in the structure somewhere, so we’d tooled up with enough cans of wasp spray.
Any way, after I got stung a few times, I beat a retreat some thirty feet away to let things clam down. After a moment or two I got stung again. Then again. etc. with increasing frequency. I finally realized the whole colony would not rest until the offender (me) was taken out.
With that, I grabbed two cans of spray and headed directly for the nest. I proceeded to bang on the logs to get them to exit. I just kept spraying; they were falling like rain. I was yelling out movie quotes; “Say hello to my little friend”, “Oh Warriors, come out & play”, etc. I blew through both cans. I probably lost six months of future hospice time with all the spray I inhaled myself
Lol, sometimes you just have to take it to them.
Bee’s release alarm pheromones that serve as a target identifier for a swarm attack. Decoys saturated with a synthetic version could serve to redirect an attack. A deployment mechanism that doesn’t further contaminate the user; and, possibly provides the user with a chemical deterrent to a swarm would be ideal.
I saw a couple of flaming arrows made from kerosene soaked rags tied onto target arrows work pretty effectively on a large paper hornet nest once. That was kind of fun too.
They all used the koi pond to pick up water, I could not enjoy the pond.
Whipped out the wet dry shop vac, and had a great time vacuuming them up around the waterfall.
The bounce off the barrier at the end of the hose and splat themselves.
New roof greatly diminished their numbers!
I learned about 30 years ago that bees are driven crazy by plaid. I was attacked in the Grand Canyon while wearing a plaid shirt. I threw it off and the bees left me alone.
I simply typed “Africanized killer bee map” into Google Images and found a bunch of them.
On the other end, depending on the level allergy and location of the sting, one might kill you.
And then there is the problem that any flying, stinging insect is a "bee". Most honey bees are pretty unlikely to sting -- a beekeeper can completely disassemble the hive, rob honey, drop a frame of bees and not get a single sting. Youtube has lots of videos of beekeepers working hives in t-shirt and shorts.
A true honeybee swarm is generally harmless. Bees defend the hive and the honey stores, and a swarm is bees leaving to establish a new hive.
With Africanized bees, none of this applies. But most of the time the African genetics just get mixed into the normal honeybee genes and you get hives that are far more likely to sting, but still fall well short of the all-out kill response of African bees.
Aerosal can of foam
The number of bee hives are falling. Without bees man will starve to death.
I’m aware that they’ll keep stinging you when you come up to breath. But it’s a last resort.
I saw a study on some TV show and they said Africanized bees will follow you up to a mile. And they’re definitely adapting to colder climates.
So, do native Africans “harvest” honey from Africanized bees? Or does the term “Africanized” refer only to a strain that came out of a once in a life time mixed breeding episode? In other words, when a mild queen from Africa bred with a normal bunch of drones from Italy.
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