WDB
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Post by WDB on Apr 5, 2020 15:08:00 GMT
There’s a popular idea that bumble bees don’t sting. I heard the opposite from my A-level chemistry teacher, Mr Ayling, when he surprised one in the prep room. I surprised one in the lawn this afternoon, and Mr Ayling was right. Ow!
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Post by Humph on Apr 5, 2020 15:24:47 GMT
How TF long was your lawn if someone your height managed to sneak up on a bee? 🤔
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WDB
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Post by WDB on Apr 5, 2020 15:29:16 GMT
Let’s just say the bee and I had our minds on different things.
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Post by Humph on Apr 5, 2020 15:46:03 GMT
My son and I were riding around the country lanes this afternoon and he was stung by a bee.
Anyway, even though we've lived here for nearly 20 years, there were little lanes I've never been down. Just kept taking random turns while keeping a sense of direction by the position of the sun.
Some amazing properties now and then that I never knew existed. Some of them huge. One though was a converted windmill, only about 3 or 4 miles from my house as the crow flies, but again, I'd previously no idea it was there. I quite like the idea of living in a windmill for some reason. Jonathan Creek had one as I recall.
Out there in the sticks, it was so quiet, almost no traffic and the signs of Spring were showing through in nature. Quite beautiful and somehow timeless. It felt like a Spitfire or something should come roaring over at tree height.
In the end, it was a bloke in an Audi A3 that spoiled it. But that's sort of inevitable isn't it? Nearly had me in the ditch the twonk. I was turning right at a junction, having moved to the centre line, arm out to state my intention when he overtook me at the junction just before I was going to make the turn.
But like I say, it was an A3.
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Rob
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Post by Rob on Apr 5, 2020 18:12:43 GMT
Humph I hope your son was stung but a bee other than a honey one otherwise that's one less bee. See this social distancing and staying in could have saved that bee.
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Post by Humph on Apr 5, 2020 18:15:21 GMT
Bee-have... 😉
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WDB
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Post by WDB on Apr 5, 2020 20:30:10 GMT
My bumble bee was probably a queen, as they mostly are this early in the spring. Queen bees have smooth stings that they can use repeatedly, and it left a small puncture but nothing stuck in me. It flew off afterwards. So am I excused, Rob?
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Rob
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Post by Rob on Apr 5, 2020 21:15:40 GMT
You are excused but you did say bumble bee. I was referring to honey bees which cannot extract their sting and rip out part of their abdomen when they 'detach'.
We had a huge bumble bee on the front of the house last week - it was moribund and probably should not have been out of hibernation (or whatever it is called for bees). It was sadly dead later in the day.
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Post by tyrednexited on Apr 5, 2020 21:29:46 GMT
My bumble bee was probably a queen............ It flew off afterwards. ....well, it did have another appointment later in the day....
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Post by Alanović on Apr 6, 2020 8:31:56 GMT
Killed my first wasp of the year over the weekend. Tea towel slap, on to the floor, stamp and squish. If it becomes an Olympic sport, I'm sure to win gold. I'm like a man possessed when a wasp appears in the house. Even been known to fearlessly take out hornets.
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WDB
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Post by WDB on Apr 6, 2020 8:46:39 GMT
Well don’t! Wasps are useful predators and kill things that damage food crops. You don’t want them nesting in high-traffic areas of your home but that’s the only excuse for killing them.
The one you killed was a queen that had overwintered and was out looking for a nest site. It would have simply moved on if you’d shown it the door.
As for hornets, we get them round here and they’re no bother to anyone. They don’t nest near people and will do their best to steer round you if you get close. Leave them be.
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Post by Alanović on Apr 6, 2020 8:55:20 GMT
How do you know it was a queen? It was a perfectly ordinary wasp. I've had two nests over the last few years which I've had to have seen to by exterminators. One in the loft which produced hundreds, maybe thousands of them, squirming out of the fascias under the roof, swarming around the back of my house. They can sod off. The other was in the shed, and produced a similar hazard. I don't know of many food crops growing around suburban Reading which need protecting, the wasps I see round here are more interested in my bbq food and beer. I don't share.
Even if I've killed a queen (I doubt it), I'm bloody pleased to have prevented another infestation.
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WDB
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Post by WDB on Apr 6, 2020 9:06:01 GMT
All the yellow wasps you see in the spring are queens. The workers all die in the autumn as the nests break up. (The queen stops laying and without grubs to feed, the workers have no purpose to their lives and wander off in search of instant gratification — a bit like Hof and his caravan.) You can blat the one that invaded your picnic (remember picnics?) but its distress pheromones will probably summon a whole lot more.
The queens crawl into crevices in trees, walls and sheds to shelter from frost, which is why the ones you see in the spring often look faded or dusty. They then find a site for a new nest and start again. The early workers you’ll see in May are tiny, because the nest doesn’t yet have the resources to produce full-size workers, but they’ll hunt the caterpillars and aphids that damage fruit trees and the like.
Wasps are brilliant. Why people fawn over faffing, fluttering butterflies is beyond me.
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Post by Alanović on Apr 6, 2020 9:26:17 GMT
I see. So is a queen indistinguishable to the human eye from an ordinary wasp?
I still don't want them swarming my garden ever again.
Butterflies are charming and pretty and don't land on my barbecued chicken or swim in my beer can, waiting to sting me in the mouth if I dare swig therefrom.
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WDB
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Post by WDB on Apr 6, 2020 9:39:12 GMT
I see. So is a queen indistinguishable to the human eye from an ordinary wasp? Bigger — maybe 30mm long rather than 20ish — and a bit rumblier, but otherwise very similar. Once the nest is established, the queen stays inside, so unless you break a nest open (really not a good idea) you’re unlikely to see one next to a worker for comparison.
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