Calls to fire departments, exterminators spike

by Jackee Coe – Jul. 20, 2009 12:00 AM
The Arizona Republic

Experts are warning about an increase in bee swarms, spurred by the Valley’s wet winter.

Firefighters said calls about swarms in public places such as schools and parks have jumped in many cities, from the East to the West Valley. Goodyear saw the biggest spike in the first six months of the year: 59 calls, up from 18 during the same period last year.

Russ Braden, Goodyear’s interim fire deputy chief, remembers when a bee stung his arm as he dangled it outside his car window.

“It can happen anywhere at any time,” he said.

Phoenix beekeeper Jerry Keele said it’s important not to do anything that might anger bees, like squirting them with water or bug spray. Leave the bees alone and call a beekeeper.

“Just because they don’t attack at that time doesn’t mean something won’t set them off,” said Keele, owner of the Beekeeper: Total Bee Control. “Anything can set them off.”

He urged residents to take care of bee swarms immediately because they won’t go away once a colony is established. If attacked, call your fire department.

The silver lining is that the rise in bee swarms has boosted business for bee exterminators and beekeepers. Keele said his company’s calls have doubled since last year.

Tom Martin is president of AAA Africanized Bee Removal Specialists. He said he has seen the largest increase in calls since he opened his Valley-wide bee exterminating business in 1993. Calls this year have increased by 30 percent over last year, which itself had been a record year.

Martin and Keele attribute the surge in bees to the rain in the past several months, which caused more plants to bloom, creating more pollen and food.

While a potential danger to the public, more bees benefit bee farms and agricultural crops because more food is being pollinated, said Gloria Grandi-Hoffman, a scientist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Carl Hayden Bee Research Center in Tucson.

“The honeybee is really the backbone of U.S. agriculture because a third of our diet relies on honeybee pollination for production,” she said. “If we would lose our honeybees, the prices of things like almonds and apples, cherries, blueberries (and) strawberries would skyrocket because you can’t produce those crops without bringing in colonies of bees.”

Martin says that honeybees are crucial to agriculture. He said it’s important for people to be aware of their surroundings. Bees in a city aren’t the same as insects managed by keepers.

Most bees are Africanized, a more aggressive breed than European honeybees, Martin said. And the Africanized bees are spreading quickly.

“What we’re finding is these colonies of killer bees, African honeybees, are invading structures at an alarming rate,” Martin said. “What we’re seeing this year that is especially different is these colonies are much, much larger in the number of bees in a colony.”

He said colonies used to have about 30,000 bees but there are now 50,000 to 60,000 bees per colony.

The larger colonies are significant because bees attack with 10 percent of their hive, Martin said.

Bigger colonies mean more bees will attack intruders, “so an attack is far, far more dangerous,” he said.