Yesterday I showed an old two story home.
It was built in 1930
the home is vacant and in one of the rooms on the second floor there were alot of dead bees on the floor
I looked outside and saw a swarm of bees outside the room in question
The bees have a nest inside the exterior wall.
They are getting inside the home.
we will call an exterminator but I was wondering how he will get rid of bees that are living inside a wall?
Replies
Well, when that happened to me years ago, the nest was in the joist spaces inside the dining room boxed out window. The yellow jackets were eating thru the drywall and only a thin piece of paper was all that kept them out of the house.
So my buddy and I get all dressed up with nets over our heads and such and close the room off. I hold the long central vacuum hose and he has the shop vac's. We cut a small hole in the aforementioned paper and start vacuuming. Slowly enlarging the hole as parts of the nest and thousands of bees get sucked up. From time to time, we switch spots with the hose to spray bee killer down the vac hose. Slowly, over 2 or 3 hours we were able to keep sucking and making the hole bigger until we had a 3 foot hole along the joist bay which had previously been completed filled with a nest.
My buddy got stung once, I avoided all damage.
Wow that's quite a processThanks for your input
If you are certain they are honey bees, please do not have them exterminated. I keep a couple hives in my backyard. Perhaps you've read or seen some on colony collapse disorder? Bees disappearing? Honeybees are massively beneficial and in decline. Killing them is not necessary and can leave you with more hassle than you have now.
Look up beekeepers in your area, should be easy enough to do. If there are none listed, try a local feed supply store or other 'farm' establishment as those guys will usually know who keeps bees. It's likely this way you can find somebody who will come and extract them for you. Beekeeping and carpentry often go hand in hand and if you find the right guy he'll open the wall and remove 'em, close things back up nice and prevent their return. Often it's done from inside the house.
This will likely cost you--but so will exterminating. If there's enough honey in the wall, might trade for you. My hunch is you'll find someone eager to remove them for you--possibly for the honey, and the bees. (the beekeeper would hive that colony for himself)
Also, if the colony is established in the wall cavity, been there for the summer at least, gassing them will only leave you with lots of dead bees, stinky dead brood and larvae, and probably a couple hundred pounds of honey left in the wall. This is not good. Moreover, if you don't remove what's there, gassed dead or not, and then have somebody knowledgable seal up the cavity so they can't get in again, a new swarm (a swarm usually occurs in the spring, when a colony gets too big, splits off and looks for new digs--sounds like you have an active colony, not a swarm) will smell the honey and wax in the wall and move right in--garunteed.
Hope it works out. Be a real shame to kill 'em.
Google "removing swarms" for more reading.
Best regards,
Pat
bought a place once that had bees in the wall , like lots in the stud cavity
waited till winter and opened up the wall and those that flew out never got more than 3 feet before bitting the dust
in the case of wasp nests i hit the nest early in the morning with a fire extinguesher
Which end of the fire extinguisher do you hit them with?Jon"There is no good answer to a stupid question"
Russian saying
Thanks for your information It was very helpfulIf we go further into this and have the bees removed I will report back on how things wentthanks again!
Great!
I was worried you'd be like, "What's this forest fairy telling me I can't gas these bugs for!"
Or something... You never know what you'll get here!
It's a good oportunity to learn some about the critters. A honeybee colony is a pretty amazing thing. 90+% female, actually. The drones are the males, don't sting and their only purpose, to mate with the queen.
So not bad to be a drone after all.
You might be very surprised to find what's in that wall!
Best regards,
Pat
The house I grew up in had a bee colony in a south-facing bedroom wall...they lived there for years without any problems - I used to like hearing the buzzing when everything else was quiet.
When the house finally got painted, my brother got a beekeeper to come get them.
If nobody in the family is allergic, you don't HAVE to do anything...
edited to add...it would be cool to mount a glass panel in the wall, with a closable curtain, so you could have an observation hive!
Edited 8/26/2008 5:23 pm ET by kate
Hey thanks for the infofrom what I hear they sleep all night so they could put the glass panel in during the middle of the night
Kate, there are bees getting into the houseThey are coming through the wall or maybe through the atticOther than that they are not hurting anythingThey must be coming through a heat register where there is an opening or gap which would allow them through
That does make a difference - go for the beekeeper!
I was very jazzed to hear your response to this thread. Thanks for the info.
My pleasure!
Bees are pretty fun. We get up to 10 gallons of honey from our few hives each year.
Call an exterminator to determine the type of bees - if honey bees they should be able to refer a good beekeeper. If they are yellowjackets, there are a few options. If they are in a wall void they can dust the entrance from the exterior and drill a small hole through the sheetrock to dust the nest cavity. If they are in an accessible attic space they may use a small vacuum. If they have already broke through into the house be careful not to use any liquid bee sprays into the entrance as the liquid will settle to the bottom of the nest and cause even bigger problems if the whole nest crashes into the room. I have seen it a hundred times - not a pretty site...
thanksappreciate it
The last house we had out there was backing up to 21st just beside Tallgrass CC. Had a dormer that kept getting some dark spot on the ceiling. Asked the guys we bought it from and they said it had had a bee's nest and they had it removed. I think they just sprayed from afar. I ended up using Kilz and then finally did a ply underlay and painted it.
Like the others said real bees and not wasps (which includes Yellow bas***, I mean jackets) look for a beekeeper. At least around here there is a serious shortage of true honey bees and agriculture all over is suffering. If the latter, then get them nuked.
BobFor those who have fought for it Freedom has a flavor the protected will never know.
If you have bees, removing the hive can be quite a mess. And when I have done that in the past, you will probably have bees return in the evening after their home has been removed/destroyed. But, that is a necessity.
It best to remove the colony in the middle of the day when many of the workers are foraging. They will return at night/afternoon. In time, since the queen is gone and the wall will be closed up, the bees will die off.
A good beekeeper will leave an empty used hive near the old hive in your wall, so the bees have a place to move into (its mostly out of curiosity that they will go into the new hive). And when the beekeeper comes back a day or two later, at night, the beekeeper can take that second hive away to remove some more of the remaining bees. the bees can be joined w/another hive, or given a new queen, if the old one was not saved/found and can carry on with their business at a new home. (you can buy just queens)
When you are on a ladder (usually) tearing into someones house, with a veil and gloves on and a smoker, only a really nice beekeeper will stay around to repair the construction damage. Good luck on his/her knowledge of construction.
I will say that most people are really just gratefull to have the colony removed.
Leaving a colony in a wall will eventually become a big mess even though bees are very clean insects, they will even remove dead bees from the hive and fly their dead off to a distant place. In fact, a newly born bee will start cleaning the neighboring comb within seconds of being born, before its done anything else, amazing.
If you have wasps (the're yellow, not orange/brown like bees) they are great at keeping insect populations down/low, but are more of a nuisance. Go ahead and give them the Raid.
Good luck, bees work thier whole life and only make 1/10 teaspoon of honey. Remember that when its going into your tea. Take care
Probably should have addressed that to the OP. Great info though.For those who have fought for it Freedom has a flavor the protected will never know.