NEW ORLEANS (WGNO) – As temperature drop, bees are looking for someplace warm to hunker down, and that place could be your home.
“In the wall, like they are in the wall,” says Dat Boi Cue outside Judah Clan studios in Treme.
“They go through that hole. There is a hole in the top they go in,” says Judah Clan Bug behind the building.
Oh Bee-have!
Both musicians are talking about bees you can’t see anymore, which during spring and summer would swarm by the thousands, now hiding between inside and out.
“They were in a house next door and I think they transferred over,” says Bug.
As temperature drop, bees are looking for someplace warm to hunker down.
“Right now they’re getting the last little bit of nectar that’s available,” explains bee expert Jeff Armstrong, aka JP the Bee Man. “As we start getting cold fronts they’re going to start clustering. They’ll be less active.”
Armstrong says just because bees aren’t swarming, doesn`t mean they aren’t there, “I could probably pinpoint thirty-five different houses right now that have bees living in them. They are not out to get you. Leave them alone allow them to work.”
“They might be honey bees, music bees, killer bees,” wonders Cue. “Music was playing and then there was like a swarm of probably like a million bees. Now they’re inside the walls.”
Armstrong says bees don`t know the difference between natural and manmade structures. “You can go into the colony and remove the queen and the bees will just make a new one.”
Albert t Einstein said, “If the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would have only four years of life left.”
So Armstrong highly encourages safe and proper removal, “They are responsible for pollinating more than a third of the food we eat. But as long as they’re in that same spot they will continue to let off swarms and repopulate the neighborhood.”
Bees typically become more active around late February or March.
Unitl then, Armstrong says, just let them be, “You don’t bother with them, they could care less about you. They just want to come and go and do their little activities. So if you don’t have the proper equipment and you don’t have bee knowledge, you really should consider calling a professional because these hives get pretty big numbers wise.”
Once bees are removed from the home Armstrong says to seal up every hole, so scout-bees know not to come back.
To learn more about JP the Bee Man visit his website: jpthebeeman.com