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Letter to the editor

Hive worries neighborhood

But an expert says they are not feared killer bees.

By EILEEN SCHULTE, Times Staff Writer
Published January 19, 2008

A beekeeper hired to remove this hive in a tree near a Safety Harbor day care says the occupants are likely honey bees.
	[Atoyia Deans | Times]

ADVERTISEMENT [Atoyia Deans | Times] Playground equipment was idle as fears grew about a beehive in a tree across from First Baptist Church's day care on Oakhaven Drive in Safety Harbor.

SAFETY HARBOR - It looks like a dead pig hanging in a tree, and it has neighbors buzzing on Oakhaven Drive.

On Monday afternoon, Susan Strong was standing on the playground talking with parents at the Sonlight Learning Center at First Baptist Church of Safety Harbor when they noticed something high in an oak across the street.

Using binoculars borrowed from a neighbor, Strong, the school's director, looked 30 or 40 feet up.

What she saw shocked her.

Royalty had moved onto the block.

A queen bee and her workers were building a colony as large as a loggerhead turtle.

Have killer bees taken up residence in Safety Harbor?

Probably not. When city officials described the hive to Ken Stack, a Wesley Chapel beekeeper hired to remove it, he said they are probably honey bees.

"There are no killer bees in Florida," he said. "They may have some African genetic material, but that doesn't make them a bad bee."

Stack said the bees, whose hive is near 14th Avenue S, a few blocks south of Main Street, will not attack unless threatened. He was amused that residents on the street believed the bees moved in only last week.

"That hive site has been well-established for months and months," Stack said.

Clearly, the children playing soccer, climbing the playground equipment and running around have yet to provoke the insects.

"Not even one bee has bothered us," Strong said.

Still, she is keeping the children inside until the colony is removed.

Ellen Starkey, who is visiting Sunny Wright and his family, who live across from the school, said she's never seen anything like it.

"I thought it looked like a saddle," she said this week.

The Wrights' cat, Paco, a snow-white cat with one green eye and one blue eye, seemed unconcerned, so his owners let him lounge on the front lawn.

But Lori Foynes' kitty, Snickels, has been confined to his house.

"I don't want him to be bitten," she said. "He's very unhappy."

Ruth Mabee, who lives next door to the Wrights, wasn't aware of the hive when she noticed a single bee sitting on her white picket fence early this week.

She was thrilled. She likes bees.

"My family was in the bee business," she said.

When she looked up into the tree, she was amazed at the size of the colony.

Although Mabee acknowledges that the bees cannot be allowed to set up housekeeping on Oakhaven Drive, she doesn't want them killed. As a species - one that farmers depend on to pollinate a third of the nation's food supply - bees have enough trouble as it is.

Last year, beekeepers in dozens of states began noticing a large-scale disappearance of bees. By March, about 35 percent of Florida's colonies had disappeared in what became known as Colony Collapse Disorder.

Scientists compared the problem to AIDS and said the causes hadn't been nailed down. But some leading suspects included fungus, certain pesticides and the practice of trucking bee hives long distances to pollinate crops. That, some researchers said, might have strained their ability to recover from infections and exposed them to more diseases and toxic chemicals.

"Bees are disappearing from across the U.S.," Mabee said. "I want them captured and relocated."

She will get her wish. On Tuesday, Stack plans to start dismantling the hive "alive and in a humane" manner.

The little flyers will go live with Stack's bees in Wesley Chapel.

That's good news for Rose Clinton, who lives a few doors down from the hive.

She would barely step out of her house one afternoon this week to talk to a reporter.

"This scares the hell out of me," she said."

Eileen Schulte can be reached at schulte@sptimes.com or (727) 445-4153.

[Last modified January 18, 2008, 21:28:57]