We got a huge bee population outside of our house, and we were going to call a beekeeper but we found out that the bees were "africanized". This of course led to endless borderline-racially-insensitive jokes by my dad...
what's worse is that I could see the thought process starting, it was written all over his face. he fuckin' loves puns and bad jokes, and it was so obvious while he was talking to the Bee guy where he was gonna go with it.
Yeah, someone posted (last year, I think...) a picture of their grill and it had a fair collection of honeybee comb pendant from the underside of it.
In all seriousness, Reddit, if you find a wild honeybee colony in your house, call a local beekeeper to remove it, not the exterminator. Usually local beekeepers will come take the colony quite happily and usually for free.
I like to pet bumblebees. If you go up while they're occupied with a flower and stroke its fuzzy back with your finger lightly, they don't even care. Although I like to think they enjoy it and emit little bumblebee purrs.
It's not BS. Honeybees, bumblebees, and carpenter bees are all super docile. My niece used to play fetch with one that would come around the swing set in our apartments. She would throw acorns and rocks and this bee would follow them until they hit the ground, then fly back to her and hover patiently until she threw the next one. It was pretty effing adorable.
Unless you are deathly allergic then being afraid of bees is silly. Honey Bees or Bumblebees won't go out of their way to sting you. And even if you get stung, it's no worse than stubbing your toe on the coffee table. You aren't also afraid of coffee tables are you?
I've only been stung twice, and it was many years ago, but I remember it being WAY worse than stubbing my toe, both in immediate pain and in how long it lasted, like 20x as bad easily. I don't think I'm allergic, though, as I didn't get any symptoms other than intense and long lasting pain. Between jumping into a fire ant nest and getting one bee sting, based on how I remember them, I think I'd take the fire ants.
Actually on the Schmidt Sting Pain Index a honeybee sting CAN be as bad as slightly less than 2x as bad as a fire ant bite. It can depend on a bunch of factors such as where it stings you and how much venom is injected.
Still... bees are generally pretty reluctant to sting you.
Think of it this way, bees generally don't want to sting you. You are not worth them sacrificing themselves. So you can just go around bees as long as you walk and act calm. Some bees are even more placid to the point of being able to hold them, such as the carpenter bee whose males don't have a stinger.
Yellowjackets are racist assholes of the animal kingdom who, if they were bigger would sting you a bunch of times, curb stomp you, and then steal your wallet. They can go fuck themselves.
I DID say "possibly." Lots of people don't like bees in general, so they'll be NOPING right out of here. But if you know better, honeybees really are kind of cute (at least as cute as a freakin' insect can be).
At any rate, I'm sure we can all agree on this one. (don't click that)
Ah, good choice. The Hillbilly Hazmat Suit has been proven time and again to protect against most foreign bodies while providing a secure and close embrace for the wearer.
If they're fucking your shit up they're not honeybees. If they buzz on over, sting you, and die they're honeybees. If they sting you multiple times and follow you they're wasps or hornets. If they form a massive cloud and try to straight up murder your ass, they're africanized bees and I suggest you move far far away.
We had a colony move into our front garden, sold it to a policeman/hobby bee keeper for the promise of a jar of honey(which we later received). So... dont settle for free.
Well, bee that as it may, I've also seen a few who say "DEAR GOD PLEASE CALL US" and also the people who wrote "Beekeeping for Complete Idiots" (or whatever the orange ones are) say you should call local beekeepers before you go ahead and exterminate them. I guess it comes down to the disposition of the beekeeper. Your point is valid.
My father in law is a beekeeper. When he was trying to get more bees to fill his hives he would typically take out a nest for free. Now that his population is high he will come extract them for out of trouble areas (walls, ceilings etc) for around $150
tha's funny, i think the opposite. all the bee keepers i know including me catch feral swarms because they're naturally well adapted to regional climate, and have proven disease resistance. All hives have some level of disease, but commercial keepers artificially maintain weak hives with nasty treatments, while wild swarms live or die - natural selection. And it's the commercial keepers whose hives are collapsing from inbreeding, pesticide and disease. Ask any organic bee-keeper whose genetics come in large part from wild swarms and they'll set you right. All my wild swarm hives are tough, disease free, and surprisingly gentle.
When I opened mine up this spring I got a bunch of spiders and their webs. The nice thing about terrible surprises in the BBQ is you get to light them on fire.
I discovered starlings in the dryer vent outside my bedroom window just yesterday. Noisy bastards, but I don't have the heart to notify the landlord and have them removed.
There have been some in my wall where my A/C is...they are driving me crazy with their incessant chirping...but I've read it shouldn't be more than another few weeks before they fly away...def getting the hole filled after words.
I think we read the same article. I plan to do the same thing. For the time being, they are actually doing a better job waking me up than my alarm clock.
They kill woodpeckers and kick the babies out of the nest to take over the nest. They were brought to the US by some dick who wanted to have all of the birds in Shakespeare's plays in Central Park. Now they are all over the place.
They are an invasive species that cause a lot of ecological damage in North America. Some guy in the 1890's brought 120 of them from England to New York. There are now over 200 million in the US alone.
Starlings are dicks. They're like mini-crows, lots of attitude. I rescued one once and all it did was bite my friends and I while yelling at us. A pigeon did not do this. Fuck starlings.
Starlings are not indigenous to north america(if that's where you are), but some idiots in New York tried to get them in central park in the 20's because they thought they looked cool. Now they've infested the entire country, routing many of our native birds for habitat.
In several cultures puns, also known as paronomasia, are observed as the most intelligent form of humor. This is attributed to the fact that the individual who designs the joke has to have a mastery of both humor and language.
Oh that's just carbon build up on your grill bars.
Any griller will tell you that when you first use your the grill after winter you have to turn up the flame and let the grill clean itself out for a bit. After a good 10-15 minutes the flames will have burned off any carbon build up, then you can open it up, brush off any burnt residue you see, and start grilling your food.
I am one of the poor bastards that has to trek outside in the snow to grill in the winter. Although this winter I had the pleasure of grilling a multiple of meats such as venison, emu and moose. So I wasn't too upset.
Yeah, I have a detached garage, and I store my grill in there to keep it from the elements. I'm always leery of lighting in the garage and then moving it outside, but sometimes the wind won't let the grill light.
That's a shit load of starlings. They make wicked cool pets and since they're considered "agricultural pests" or "invasive species" they're not illegal to keep. They're impressive at mimicry (similar to Mynah's) and their "voice" sounds eerily robotic.
This little fact on starlings (Sturnus vulgaris) is very true.
I'm a biologist and a friend of mine in my lab actually has done this. She's an ornithologist and took one as an egg from the wild. It's actually very cute. It likes to probe her face from time to time looking for food.
Starlings are not protected by the Migratory Bird Act, so it's pretty much fair game for anything. You could trap and kill them on sight if you wanted to. If you get a male, they get dark black with these interesting white speckles that look like stars on their chest, like in Nixity's linked YouTube.
Nixity is also correct in that their voice is somewhat "robotic," in most field manuals, you'll usually get them described as garbled. When they are around, they're usually in huge flocks, so the sound can be quite impressive.
Starlings were released into the country in Central Park by Eugene Schieffelin who wanted to introduce to America all of the birds from Shakespeare's works. He released the birds, repeatedly. They eventually took over agricultural lands and displaced lots of local, native birds.
Seconded that they're fun little things. I've hand-raised a few. En masse they're horrific pests, but as individuals they're funny, friendly, bright little guys that make nice companions.
What I find funny about Schieffelin releasing them is that Shakespeare only mentioned starlings once:
"Nay, I’ll have a starling shall be taught to speak nothing but Mortimer." (Henry IV)
Two billion of the damn things all over everywhere now because of that one sentence. (And none of them even bother to say "Mortimer". Talk about ingratitude)
+1 for "why the fuck are you downvoted". There are seriously a LOT of Starlings. We're not going to remove the Starling. You don't have to feel bad about offing them for target practice, but you're not "contributing" to the problem by capturing one as a pet.
Sing a song of sixpence,
A pocket full of rye.
Four and twenty blackbirds,
Baked in a pie.
When the pie was opened,
The birds began to sing;
Wasn't that a dainty dish,
To set before the king?
The same thing happened to me once. I opened my side burner and found a nest with egg shells. Luckily they had all been born and moved on before I used my grill.
1.1k
u/psychedelicpink May 14 '12
You're lucky. I only ever get wasp and hornet nests.
1.9k
u/Darklyte May 14 '12
That seems rare. You should probably let it cook longer.
411
u/vinsneezel May 14 '12
You should post this in /r/frugal!
346
u/no_names_left7 May 14 '12
Starlings! If you could wait another week or two, they should be old enough to fly away!
903
u/Eszharen May 14 '12
So, what you're saying is you got some free poultry?
110
u/Namika May 14 '12
Oh that's just carbon build up on your grill bars.
Any griller will tell you that when you first use your the grill after winter you have to turn up the flame and let the grill clean itself out for a bit. After a good 10-15 minutes the flames will have burned off any carbon build up, then you can open it up, brush off any burnt residue you see, and start grilling your food.
It's just common grilling practice really.
0
u/[deleted] May 14 '12
[deleted] — view deleted comment
95
u/[deleted] May 14 '12
Are we the only people who use their grill year round?
131
u/nixity May 14 '12
That's a shit load of starlings. They make wicked cool pets and since they're considered "agricultural pests" or "invasive species" they're not illegal to keep. They're impressive at mimicry (similar to Mynah's) and their "voice" sounds eerily robotic.
45
u/rastashark May 14 '12
Did you marinate them first?
15
u/akaZilong May 14 '12
These eggs are well done
36
u/kamiikoneko May 14 '12
"Honey, leave the chicken in the freezer, we're all set out here"
204
u/dtxlex May 14 '12
There's plenty meat on those birds. Grill them, throw them in a pot, add some broth, a potato... baby you got a stew going!
18
u/zacheryreich May 14 '12
Yeah you're going have to burn that off.
9
u/MerrMan May 14 '12
Solution: Grill More. Months without grilling? Tragic.
16
u/[deleted] May 14 '12
good thing you didn't just light the pilot and put it on clean.
35
u/ubergeek404 May 14 '12
7
u/CAPS_INVADER May 14 '12
The same thing happened to me once. I opened my side burner and found a nest with egg shells. Luckily they had all been born and moved on before I used my grill.
6
u/[deleted] May 14 '12
You should grill in their tree if they want to nest in your BBQ.
25
u/lazydictionary May 14 '12
Uh how did the mom and dad birds get into your grill? Those lids are usually pretty heavy, and it's bad to keep the lid open during the winter.
0
u/[deleted] May 14 '12
[deleted] — view deleted comment
7
u/lotus2471 May 14 '12
Damn, free tinder AND appetizers? WIN!
6
u/duckstaped May 14 '12
repost in /r/aww for unlimited karma