at the end of a very busy week-the bees paid a visit. friday late afternoon, we noticed a large swarm of bees on our back patio. they were buzzing around for about 20 minutes-then it was obvious they were not leaving. i have a potting bench on the patio-the “legs” are made to look like vertical birdhouses-complete with holes. the bees just started moving in-

we do not spray our yard for anything-we deal with the ants and spiders that make their way into the house with a non toxic  orange peel based spray. so-we have a lot of insect life-including bees-which i love. however, as much as i like having them in the garden, making their hive on the patio doesn’t work for me (of course one of the dogs got stung right away).

i started going though the yellow pages and calling bee services. it was fairly easy to find someone to come out and kill them-not so easy to find someone willing to do  a live removal.( finding anyone in LA to come out on a fri night for anything is hard in the first place).

i am thrilled to have stumbled upon kirk the bee man!  in desperation, i went on the internet and his blog came up. what a great guy, so knowledgeable and passionate about his bee’s. i am happy to say it was a happy ending of this colony of 20,000-25,000 bee’s (yep-all those zero’s are correct) it took him a little over an hour to collect them all-then they were on their way to spend the night at kirks silverlake home.  sat they would  go to their new home at a fellow beekeeper’s in the LA area- a happy ending for all except oreo (the youngest dane)- she ate one and had a very swollen tongue for awhile!

you can visit kirks blog at http://beehuman.blogspot.com/2009/03/bee-removal-in-los-angeles.html