Just seen that a round soffit vent has fallen out and there’s a steady stream of bees going in and out the hole.
What’s the best plan?
If i just leave them bee will they do any damage?
Someone asked a similar question the other day. IIRC the conclusion was that a bee-keeper will happily take away honey bees and can relocate non-honey bee nests. I think.
I spoke to a bee keeper on thursday last week, wouldn’t touch them as they’re not honey bees, would only intervene if they posed a threat to someone or were inside the house (not just loft)
Ours turned out to be tree bees, a fairly social kind of bumblebee. We left well alone. Come mid July, they’d all disappeared. They were a lot more welcome than the wasps who moved in the year before.
If its honey bees, phone a beekeeper (however if the swarm is properly moved in, there isn’t a lot they can do). With other bees, I can’t imagine they’d be a problem, they’re not aggressive/annoying like wasps.
The main danger with live honey bees is the comb can drip and get everywhere. And when they move out/die/get poisoned/etc, lots of other creepy crawlies start getting very interested in the remaining honeycomb.
Thanks danny.
Most helpful.
Just spoken to a swarm collector who said not to bee worried about them as they’d not bee able to cause any damage and they’d bee on their way soon enough.
I was kind of hoping there might bee a few more puns and song references. 🙂
Something by Sting, perhaps. Mind you, even if it was the best pun in the world, I don’t think I could bring myself to link to anything by the second most egotistical man in pop.
They could be masonary bees which like to live in walls in which case they very rarely return to the same place to set up home. It could be a swarm that’s looking for a new home, the bees will swarm, find a stop gap home for a few days and then move on to somewhere more suitable. If they are honey bees and have decided to set up house in yours wild colonies unfortionately rarely survive a winter by themselves so no worries there. You could ask another local beekeeper but going up a ladder to the roof to collect a swarm is not a very appealing idea even if you know what you are doing. Let them do their thing and it will sort itself out. Bees really are suffering at the moment from pesticides and invasive pests. They are fascinating and beautiful little beasts and mine produce great honey!
We had bumble bees last summer and they are back again this year. Student at work keeps bees back home and not interested in moving them…. They’ll be gone in a few months and don’t do damage.
Ours are crawling up the wall behind soffit and doing a fair hike to end up under loft insulation. Buzzing away on top of ceiling plasterboard directly above our bed – Alison’s side luckily :-). They got noisy enough to consider extermination last week but now gone a bit quieter. Once gone will be plugging up any gaps and getting rid of nest remains.
They could be masonary bees which like to live in walls in which case they very rarely return to the same place to set up home. It could be a swarm that’s looking for a new home, the bees will swarm, find a stop gap home for a few days and then move on to somewhere more suitable.
Now that is interesting, we had this a few weeks ago, swarming under the soffit, but no sign of them now. Learned something! We had wasps last year on the other side of the house, they got the poison gas treatment. But I’d have left the bees to themselves. Bees are cool, m’kay?
When we moved into our new house, first evening I popped out to do some shopping to receive a call from Mrs Q that we were under attack from a swarm of angry bees who had been attracted by the light.
Got back to find 1000s of bees all over the house and garden. After battling with them and the spray, turning the lights out, we all left the house for the night and called the bee people from work.
What I had thought was an old bee hive hanging from the tree, was in fact a 1m+ long bee nest, a good 20cm thick at it’s base, covered in bees, from the ground it looked like it was just dark brown and dead, turns out the dark brown was covered in little curious bees.
Bee guys burnt the nest. Couldn’t really leave it there with the swarm going mad whenever the lights were on, and it was too high up to cut down.
Wasps get angry as they feed off their young who produce a sugary type substance but stop doing this as they mature. So mum and dad wasps are like crack heads with the supply cut off hence annoying you in the pub beer garden later in summer,especially if you have a sugary alcohol style drink. Bees on the other hand are well cool and do everything for the greater good. You’ve started me off now, pity poor Geoff tonight on our two pint Tuesday meet up.