This morning when I left for work, I noticed approximately ten honeybees sitting, motionless, on the inside of the closed garage door. It was the first time I had seen bees in the garage and I was worried they might be swarming in the roof or something since it didn’t seem likely that all of them had gotten in by accident, but there was no swarm that I could see; just ten motionless bees. I left them there and went to work.
When I came home this evening, the bees were no longer on the garage door. I thought they must have flown away until I noticed a dead bee on the ground. Looking closer, I found another, and another, and another. In all, I counted twenty-five dead bees on the ground, and one that was still alive and standing but barely moving.
There are two mysteries here:
- Where did the twenty-six bees come from?
- What killed twenty-five of them and left one virtually paralyzed?
Anyone?
Comments
CO
1. Where do babies come from? 2. Carbon Monoxide?
Viruses
According to Wikipedia, there are several paralyzing bee viruses. It might be one of those.
Mafia
You didn’t get the hint the first 25 times.
Some form of insect mafia is after you man.
Wow
...I mean, really?
Evolve or perish!
Ditto on the bee viruses. Supposedly honey bees are dying left and right in North America, and have been for the past couple years or so. Poor wittle guys.
could be antifreeze
just a though, but antifreeze puts off a sweet aroma just like flowers. I have seen bees attracted to it. Just a thought, but if you have recently topped off your radiator, or have a small leak it could be attracting them if there’s a hive nearby.
Bee immune deficiency
While there has been little news on the subject for the past several months, and the jury is still out on the actual cause(s) of the bee die-off, the most convincing arguments I have seen discuss that there are several different viral diseases which seem to be responsible for the collapse of individual colonies, but that disease agents do seem to be a major factor. With regard to the paralysis, it looks like there are a couple of paralytic bee viruses one of which is implicated as a marker associated with Colony Collapse Disorder.
Bee death and swarms
I know this is an old post, but I’ve noticed this same thing at my work and don’t know anyone else who has. Every morning when I went in to open up the store, there were 15 or 20 dead honey bees on the floor (both inside that maybe crawled under the door, and a couple outside the door that never got in). I know there’s a hive on the building roof next door as I’ve seen it myself, but I’m incredibly curious why there are so many dead bees in that one particular area (30 feet away from the hive). Hmm.
The craziest thing I’ve seen, though, is the absolutely massive swarm of bees that gathered in the parking lot (it takes up a 2 block space) across the street from work. There were millions and millions of bees. Never in my life, or my grandparents lives, have any of us seen that. They were very very slowly moving away…there were just so many and so densely packed into this 2 block parking lot, and maybe 20 feet high over the ground. ?