50,000 Bees in Home Shocked Resident
A photojournalist in California uncovered a hive containing 50,000 bees that was located in the walls of his house.
Larry Chen, 27, spends a great deal of his time traveling and he was unaware of the size the hive had grown to, but decided to investigate after he noticed a several bees routinely flying outside of his window.
"I'm not really terrified of the bees … I just remained calm, and I figured they wouldn't bother me too much … I got stung once, but I was more curious about how big the hive actually was. I figured it was just a small clump of 1,000 or so," Chen told ABC.
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Not wanting to eradicate the hive, Chen found a professional beekeeper on Craigslist who said that he would be able to safely remove the bees an relocate them to a another area.
The bee keeper, Mike Bee, is a member of the rescue organization Backwards Beekeepers, a group that works with HoneyLove.org in order to educate the public about the importance of bees, according to ABC.
"My policy is to relocate, not exterminate," the bee handler stated.
The removal of the bees from the house took about five hours for Mike to complete. The bees were captured using a specially designed vacuum that sucks up the bees and puts them in two specially designed containers capable of containing 20,000 bees each.
It was found that the bees entered through a ventilation pipe in the attic, Mike Bee explained. The pipes were lined with a wire mesh, but the holes were big enough for bees to fit through. The area was dark and offered protective shelter, making the space very accommodating and conducive to a beehive.
"It's good we caught it at this time because it could have been a lot bigger," Chen said.
