As a child, I was allergic to bees. Just one sting on my fingertip could swell my whole arm. I was allergic to most things – dust, cat hair, pollen – and was always clutching an inhaler, sniffling into my sleeve and keeping a safe distance from stinging insects.
As an adult, when my family bought our first house, a mid-century gem nestled in thick bushland on Sydney’s northern beaches, I wasn’t expecting a visit from my former nemesis. But one warm spring day, we heard the unmistakable hum of 20,000 of those honey-producing insects.
“Bees!” I shouted, as a large dark ball headed straight towards me and my baby girl. Terrified, I grabbed her and slammed the patio doors just in time. The swarm broke apart in the air and the buzzing became thunderous.
I later learned that bees swarm when their current hive becomes overcrowded. Once the swarming instinct is triggered, scouts head out to find a new location and the old queen and her worker bees fly off to their new, less cramped abode. The bees left behind will then raise a new queen.
During renovations we discovered masses of old honeycomb and dead bees in the ceilings and walls of our home; the swarm was likely attracted to that scent.
As tens of thousands of bees squeezed into the wall cavity of our living room, my first instinct was to call a beekeeper. Bees are a precious creature – vital for pollination, food security and a healthy ecosystem. Unfortunately, the beekeeper couldn’t help. “Once the bees are in a wall, they’re very difficult to extract,” he said, before hanging up. I called another and another, until eventually I resorted to pest control. We sealed the entry points along the wall and hoped another swarm wouldn’t find its way to us.
Years later, one did. We had just returned home from a stint in Singapore when I heard the familiar buzz of bees announcing their arrival. This swarm was big – 30,000 strong – and they quickly pushed their way into the walls and our stairwell cavity.
I tried again to find a beekeeper to guide us, desperately searching the internet for local beekeeping associations; I couldn’t stomach calling pest control again. This time, we found the right person – a young beekeeper who arrived on our doorstep an hour later with his gear and beekeeper suit.
First, he set up a lure outside – a bait hive, filled with old comb and a few drops of lemongrass oil, which mimics a bee pheromone and can entice a swarm to move. He put up a ladder and placed the wooden box near the entry point to the wall, hoping the queen and her workers would leave our property and set themselves up in the bait hive. Over the next week, we waited and watched and hoped. Unfortunately, the bees did not budge.
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The comb and some bees escaping author Pip Harry’s Sydney home
Plan B (bee?) was to entice the swarm from closer range. By now, the bees were already building comb and storing honey in a small cavity above the stairs, preparing to rear eggs and larvae. The beekeeper convinced us to let him cut a hole in our floor; he then placed the box directly on top of the hive – right in the middle of our living space. We got on with our daily lives, cooking, watching TV, working … all the while cohabiting alongside thousands of bees. Occasionally, one would pop out of our air conditioning unit or get confused on its pollen route and fly through an open window. But for the most part, they were excellent housemates.
Living with the constant low hum of bees and learning more about their behaviour and habits from the beekeeper, my fear and anxiety began to dissipate. I stopped using insect spray and instead transported the lost bees back outside on a piece of paper. I wasn’t once stung – they seemed to sense I wasn’t going to harm them.
Weeks later, we were finally ready to move the bees to greener pastures – a farm where the beekeeper already kept established hives. He confessed it was the most difficult hive removal he’d ever done. It took several 20-litre buckets full of honey and comb and a lot of smoke to calm the bees down, and some escapees, but he managed to save two-thirds of the hive.
Once the bees were gone, the house felt too quiet. Wax moths came to clean up the leftover beeswax and pollen. Spiders came to eat the wax moth and larvae. We repaired the floor.
Every spring, when the air starts to lose its chill and pollen makes me sneeze, I keep watch for scout bees and make a very important phone call. The beekeeper answers: he’ll be round with a bait hive to lure the bees away from our walls, should they come to visit. So far, so good.
Pip Harry is an author. Her latest young adult novel, Drift, inspired by her experience with the bees, is out in Australia on 30 July (Hachette Australia, $17.99)
