To "Bee" or not To "Bee"

[what2craftnow]

I was bringing my recycling can in on Thursday, and lo and behold, one of those pesky honey bees that love to hang around flew up near my face. I casually swatted him away.. and the little bugger stung me...on my middle finger of all places! :groucho: Three days later, I am near crazy with the itching , but now it's swelling up again which is REALLY cramping my mini-ing as I don't seem to mini well with a finger the size of a sausage!

Anyone else have any stories to "bee" told??? ;)

[LLyn M.]

The last time I got stung...I was at a Renaisance Festival,minding my own business and a bee landed on my neck and stung me for no reason..well, HE had a reason but I

didn't.LOL! The weird part was I could feel the venom flowing through me...a very

odd feeling but interesting,(I'm a retired Nurse) but I told the person I was with what

happened in case I dropped dead or something......I didn't!

[madhatter]

I have not been stung by bees in a while , but wasps are pretty bad around here. They make there nests so fast!!!!

I went into our shed head first and they swarmed me, ahhhhhh!!!! I only ended up getting stung once, but it was right beside my eye. Ouch.!!

My hubbie got rid of the nest for me, but now im a little more timid about going into our sheds. lol

hope your finger fills better soon!!

Jenn

[KathieB]

Oooh, Chris -- bummer!

How annoying that it swelled again. Did the little bugger leave his stinger behind to fester?

[grazhina]

I still remember my first bee sting. I was in 2nd grade. It was snack time, we were drinking our orange juice. I swatted at a bee in front of my face and it stung me on the cheek. I can still feel the burn.

When I was in high school our neighbor kept honey bees, and had the hives facing towards our yard. My mother got stung on several ocassions, and wound up at the doctor's office. The last time her face was so swollen she looked like a Mongolian. The doctor said if she got stung again it could kill her, so she finally asked the neighbor to turn his hives away from our yard.

[AuntDee]

Several yearsa ago I was doing some gardening work for a couple who had just purchased a home that had been left to over growth for sometime. I was pruning some wild raspberry bushes away from a Tinkerbelle lilac bush when I felt a sharp pain in my finger. I thought, "Wow, this bush has sharp thorns to pierce my leather gloves." and suddenly a swarm of yellow jackets was attacking me. I dropped the pruners and started to run back to the van. Yelling all the time. THe yellow jackets were under my shirt so I tore my shirt off as I was running for protection. (running across the yard in my bar). When I was able to get in the van and count the stings I had 13!! The yellow jackets kept swarming the van and I couldn't get out or roll the window down or they attacked. When I thought they had left I stepped out of the van and called to John to pick up the tools so we could leave. Suddenly the yellow jackets were back. I quickly got back into the van and John was able to walk about picking up tools with no stings. If I exited the van the angry yellow jackets were back. At the pharmacists' recommendation I took Benadryl and watched for signs of a reaction. Did not have any allergic reaction but I did itch for several days. I called the home owner and told them I would be back to finish the job after they had sprayed the nest. I never did receive a call or go back to finish. I am very careful now about checking for nexts before putting my hands somewhere.

[what2craftnow]

Oh my, Rita - sounds like something out of a movie! That might cure me of gardening entirely

And mad...I think if it were me, I would be backing ever so slowly into ANY shed after that. :pope:

Mine was just a silly encounter, but it did amaze me how one innocent wave of the hand produced such a "lasting" impression. Bees certainly have all intentions of making their last move a memorable one. The beauty (and beast) of nature's design I suppose. :yay:

At least my hand is returning to normal now (still itchy, but little swelling) so I can get back to my Chantilly - which has been sending its own buzzing messages while I have been on the mend.

[JaniceG]

We have yellow jackets that make ground nests in our yard sometimes - but no bee encounters. However, a deputy's car was swarmed this summer when a bee hive fell off an 18 wheeler.

The deputy had to call for back up, lol.

[rodentraiser]

When I bought my house 5 years ago, my entire yard was sand, so I threw some wildflower seeds out. I got tons more wildflowers than I thought I would and a ton of bumblebees as well. Funny thing though, the neighbors burnt several bumblebee nests in their yard because the kids kept getting stung, but I was able to walk through the flowers and bumblebees all summer long and never got stung.

I did get stung on the toe by a yellow jacket once that was crawling on my bed. It hurt like a fire torch, but I immediately put ice on it and kept the ice there for about a half hour and it never swelled and the pain went away in a minute or so. Here's something funny though:

When I was in San Jose, I had flowers all over the place and I put out a water dish with a rock in it for the butterflies. I had tons of what I thought were bees there as well, but they never bothered me. I would sit there for an hour and watch them crowd along the side of the dish and drink.

When I had my house with the sand yard in Washington, I put another dish of water out for the "bees". I put it right by the walkway by the back door, so I wouldn't have to go far to fill it. Just like in San Jose, the bees crowded around to drink every day in the summer. I walked by them at least a couple times a day every day and never had a problem.

One day I called my neighbor to come see the pretty, friendly bees and he told me I had a wasp problem and I needed to get rid of the yellow jackets as soon as I could. But getting stung on the toe was the only problem I ever had and that's because I laid down on the bed and put my foot right on top of that one!

[otterine]

I have been stung before, when I was a child...but my bee story has a happier ending that those incidents. It was at a Renaissance Faire in Massachusetts one fall. I was drinking champagne with a strawberry in it. When the server handed it to me, some of the excess champagne spilled on my finger. I started to wipe it on my (washable) dress and noticed a bee flying around my hand. I put my hand out, palm up and the bee landed next to the drips of champagne. Another patron and I watched as the bee drank all of the liquid from my fingers and then flew off... ;) under the legal limit, I hope... :wub: