Bees attack couple in Arivaca
By Alex Dalenberg, Green Valley News
An Arivaca couple and their seven-month-old baby were airlifted to a Tucson hospital on Monday after an attempt to get rid of a bee hive near their home went bad.
Sheriff’s deputies and the Arivaca Fire Department found the couple in a pool of water at about 12:30 p.m. with their baby in the 16000 block of West Arivaca Road, according to a report from the Pima County Sheriff’s Department.
The couple said they’d been attacked by bees and that both were allergic. They were taken to the fire station and then flown to University Medical Center in Tucson.
The father had multiple stings on his chest, back, arms and legs and was wearing only coveralls. The mother also had multiple stings. The baby was not stung, but was taken to the hospital with the parents. The family was not identified.
The mother told deputies that her husband was trying to get rid of a hive on their property but that when he sprayed it with bee killer, the bees became agitated and started stinging them.
Jerry Young, who owns Buggerbees, a Pima County Bee Removal service, said that since 1993, all bees in Arizona have become Africanized and are much more aggressive. He said the mostly docile European honeybees have slowly been hybridized from breeding with a more aggressive breed of African honey bees which were introduced to the Western Hemisphere in the 1950s.
Since the Africanized bees migrated to Arizona 17 years ago, the bee business has become completely different, Young said.
“With European bees, a couple dozen would attack,” he said. “With Africanized bees, all the bees attack you. That could be thousands of bees.”
A day after the Arivaca attack, a man was stung hundreds of times after he came across a bee hive on Mount Lemmon in Tucson. In June, seven people were stung by bees that swarmed an apartment complex in Casa Grande.
Last year, a Green Valley man was stung an estimated 1,000 times when he and his dog were swarmed nearly their home while on a walk. The man recovered, but the dog died in the attack.
Because bees have become so much more aggressive, homeowners shouldn’t try to remove the bees on their own.
“If people say their grandfather treated his bees, he probably did, but it’s different now,” he said. “Steve Irwin got killed by something that’s not considered dangerous (a stringray). Bees are considered dangerous. It astounds me people take it so lightly.”
[See rest of the article here...]
“With European bees, a couple dozen would attack,” he said. “With Africanized bees, all the bees attack you. That could be thousands of bees.”
A day after the Arivaca attack, a man was stung hundreds of times after he came across a bee hive on Mount Lemmon in Tucson. In June, seven people were stung by bees that swarmed an apartment complex in Casa Grande.
Last year, a Green Valley man was stung an estimated 1,000 times when he and his dog were swarmed nearly their home while on a walk. The man recovered, but the dog died in the attack.
Because bees have become so much more aggressive, homeowners shouldn’t try to remove the bees on their own.
“If people say their grandfather treated his bees, he probably did, but it’s different now,” he said. “Steve Irwin got killed by something that’s not considered dangerous (a stringray). Bees are considered dangerous. It astounds me people take it so lightly.”
[See rest of the article here...]
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