Bees Go from Pest to Honey Makers

Jack Stone, who has a farm on Monroe Tyler Road, first noticed he had honey bees as house guests three or four years ago. He also noticed they would get a good deal more active during the spring and summer when his garden was producing. The bees had located themselves under his roof and were visible from the outside up high where the cornice met the chimney.

Knowing that honey bees were valuable, not only for their honey, but also because of their decline in population in recent years, Mr. Stone set about the process of not only removing the bees, but also saving them.

“I first contacted the Cooperative Extension Agency here in Monticello,” Mr. Stone said. “They referred me to Keith Fielder, the County Agent in Putnam County, who is a past president of the Georgia Bee Keepers Association. Mr. Fielder then referred me to Bill Owens, a Certified Master Craftsman Bee Keeper of Owens Apiaries in Monroe.”

Once Mr. Owens was scheduled and on the job with his helper, they managed to safely remove the bees over a four hour period.

Mr. Stone filled us in on how the job was accomplished.

“They had to work kind of slow so as not to excite or get the bees stirred up. They both had on bonnets and the helper wore gloves, but Mr. Owens put his bare hands right in among the bees. He got a few stings, which didn’t seem to bother him. I supposed he was accustomed to it.

“They took 10,000 bees out and Mr. Owens said if we had waited another month there would have been 30 to 40,000 because they were beginning to go into a hatching stage.

“The unique thing about the job was that he did the work from the top side by removing the shingles and cutting out a section of the roof decking. This way he eliminated the possibility of any honey dripping down into the house. As it turned out there was very little honey in there because the bees had eaten it during the cold weather.

“A very unusual thing about the hive was that Mr. Owens found two queens instead of one, which probably means they were getting ready to kick one out. After they opened up the nest he looked very carefully for the queen, and he knew where to look because of the different kinds of honey in the hive.”

According to Mr. Stone the bees will be relocated and utilized.

“They used a safe type vacuum system to store the bees in a wire cage. This accomplished the purpose I had in mind of saving the bees rather than just having them exterminated.”