I have manicured (very leefy) bushes along the front of my home. About two months ago I went to trim a bush on the side of my home and was immediately confronted with a highly organized military sytle bee attack… I’m confident that these bees studied the “shock and awe” concept that was used in Iraq… (My attempt at humor)…
Anyway, I can’t see a hive because there are a tremendous about of leaves on this bush. As a whole it stands perhaps 4 ft tall X 4 ft wide. I live in Florida but the bees are definately not Africanized. A few dozen fly out but I haven’t been stung yet (as I would if they were the more dangerous variety).
My question… How in the hell do I get rid of these darn things so that I can trim my bush? As I said… I can’t see the hive to spray it with a chemical and I can’t get near the thing without immediately pissing them off. I tried soaking the tree withTriazide (or something like that) which is supposed to kill 140 or something bugs… didn’t work.
I’m confident that the nest isn’t in the ground. As soon as I touch the bush with the hedge trimmer they freak out.
They are dead… I used two suggestions from here… I looked retarded but I put on a long sleeve shirt (tucked into my jeans), put gloves on over the sleeves, pulled my socks up around my pant legs, and used a few T-Shirts to wrap my head up (except for my eyes). I pulled the branches of the bush down slowly with a couple of rakes that I had in the garage and exposed the nest (which thankfully was exactly where I looked the very first time). (Yellow Jackets with a paper nest)… I left the rakes in place and sprayed the heck out of the nest with some wasp/hornet killer… No more problem. I kind of feel like a wuss for not getting to them sooner but what can I say… don’t like bees…
Thanks for all the help.