Should we have bumblebees in February?

Big fat one, happily droning around in the sunshine...

 

The buzzing bastards have awakened early this year and are humming
around here looking for trouble. Nasty little black and dirty yellow
fuckers with an attitude, I just can't kill them. Not that I can't bring
myself to kill them, I mean I *can't* kill them, despite several
attempts over the years, involving sulphur fumes, exhaust gas, powder,
insecticide sprays, etc, etc. On several days the ground underneath the
nest has been littered with bee bodies, an apiaral version of the Somme,
but the cunts always recover, regroup and launch another attack.
--
Dave
GS850x2 XS650 SE6a

"A scone and tea at half past three
Makes the day a little brighter
Keep your cakes and fancy tarts
And stick them up your shiter."

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique, Grimly Curmudgeon

Why on Earth would you want to kill bumble bees? Totally harmless little
blighters.

Leave them alone, you nasty man.

 

Last year I pointed a webcam out of the window at the buddleia so I could
watch the bees from work, but each and every day the sun whited out the
camera and I could only get about 30 mins of bee a day.

Bees are ace, wasps are fit only to adorn the radiator grill of anything
that travels faster than 40mph.

 

Are they even capable of stinging? In any case, I've never heard of
anyone being stung by one, so I don't know why someone would want to
hurt them. Regular beez as well, why worry, unless you've deliberately
disturbed them they tend to live and let live.

 

They're big because they have loads of anti-wasp explosive strapped
under their coats.

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique, Mark Olson

They can in theory.

Me neither.

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique, Champ

Not true

True

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique, Champ

Well, they're not really like true social insects.

Usually a lot fewer that 50. About a dozen, IME.

Some people just like to kill stuff. Imagine!

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique, Champ

Bizarro.

 

Bumble Bees would be lovely, but these ain't. Yer average BB wouldn't
give a shit about anyone coming and going, this particular Swarm of
Satan take great exception to the merest hint of having to share their
space with anything resembling a human shape.

I will not rest until they, or I, are dead.
--
Dave
GS850x2 XS650 SE6a

"A scone and tea at half past three
Makes the day a little brighter
Keep your cakes and fancy tarts
And stick them up your shiter."

 

No, we shouldn't but then we _should_ have mosquitoes and we haven't. I've
an allergy to the anticoagulant in their saliva which causes bites to swell
up to golf ball-size. So I'm always wary of the 'first bite' of the year
after which I bring out the citronella and/or the plug-in repellants.

I haven't been bitten since October 2006.

Will it be global warming that will wipe us out, or will Ahmadinejad get
there first? Questions, questions ...

D.

--
des
French Biking Vocabulary: http://minilien.fr/a0kg0p

'Kaiser: "Can you prove to me the existence of G-d?"
Bismarck: "The Jews, your Majesty. The Jews"'

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique, Grimly Curmudgeon

How very odd. Perhaps they get pissed off by a madman repeatedly
firebombing their nest?

Take off, nuke, orbit, etc.

 

I've had this before, and now get round it by packing a tube of
hydrocortisone cream in my away kit, calms them down no end, it does.

 

What a complete wuss.
Bumble bees do not have a sting, they are good for the garden.
They are also an endangered species so LEAVE THEM ALONE.

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique,
typed

Oh but they do, you know.

 

Apparently we get a nest of them every June at the chateau. Not been
there myself when it is active, but a mate of mine who was there for a
week said the only problem was the noise. Once he spotted where they
were going in an out of the eaves in to the loft, and confirmed they
weren't wasps he just let them get on with it and moved into the other
bedroom to escape the buzzing.


--

+-------------------------------------------------------------+
| Pete Fisher at Home: |
| Voxan Roadster Gilera Nordwest Yamaha WR250Z |
| Gilera GFR * 2 Moto Morini 2C/375 |
+-------------------------------------------------------------+

 

There aren't an excessive number of mosquitos in Derby for some strange
reason...

 

Apparently (even though I hate the little bastards) the world would be
a somewhat different place without wasps. I'm told they eat a vast
amount of nasty little bugs that compete with us for food. They also
have been known to polinate the odd plant.

--
--

Paul.
CBR1100XX SuperBlackbird (Buen mueble de patio)
And a pushbike of some sort.
BOTAFOT #4
BOTAFOF #30
MRO #24
OMF #15
UKRMMA #30

Ovejas y buitres:
http://obscuredomainname.org

 

Nor me. BumbleBeez live in small colonies (a few dozen), and generally
on the ground, or rather in it. They produce just enough hunny to feed
themselves and no more, so humes leave them alone and concentrate on the
other Beez.

Which suggests that BumbleBeez might be smarter than we realise.