BY ANDY TAYLOR
Montgomery County Chronicle
CANEY — Ever since last March, something has been abuzz in the aging elm tree outside the home of Dorothy Kendrick.
At first, she saw a few bees gathering around a crusty limb on that tree near the corner of Third and Spring streets.
She didn’t think anything about it at first. But, over the months, she saw that band of bees make a large sanctuary in that tree. Large bands of honeycombs appeared on the branch. Honey bees, she concluded. However, because the limb was more than 25 feet from the ground, she took little interest in the hive or the bees that were creating the buzz.
However, when her nephew on Tuesday removed a tree limb that had fallen near a neighbor’s car, the nephew was struck by the sound of ornery bees buzzing above his head.
“I’ve been meaning to get that old tree cut down, but I knew it would be impossible to hire anyone to cut the tree down if there was a bee hive in it,” said Kendrick.
And, because of the aggressive nature of the bees, some neighbors and friends were questioning if the hive was filled with the African killer bees that have been slowly making their way northward from South America.
Questions were asked around town.
Coffee shops began filling with rumors.
And, a few telephone calls were made Tuesday to see if the busy hive of bees could be identified by an entomologist.
Glenn Salsbury of Frontenac, Kan., came to the rescue Tuesday afternoon and provided the answers.
As a survey entomologist for the Kansas Department of Agriculture, Salsbury was able to spray a strong dose of soapy detergent on the bee hive, which killed a large volume of the bees. The detergent adds weight to the bee wings, causing the insects to meet mortality upon crashing to the ground.
“There were probably about 1,000 bees in that hive,” he said. “But, I can tell you with 99.9 percent certainty that they were not African killer bees. They were not aggressive enough.”
Salsbury took a sample of the honeycombs and the bees for further analysis. The evidence will be sent to a laboratory in Arizona, where scientists will look at the bees’ DNA to officially determine its type.
The entomologist said he believed the hive to be filled with the European bees, which still can offer a nasty punch when stirred or annoyed. That was the case in October when a man in Uniontown, Kan., was stung more than 1,000 times after coming in contact with a hive of European bees. The man ran more than 200 yards away from the hive and jumped into a pond. But the bee colony still unleashed its stingers — sending the man for treatment in a hospital for a full week.
“If he had been attacked for a few more minutes, he probably would have died,” he said.
Salsbury also said he would be surprised — and alarmed — if the results of the DNA analysis showed the bees to be the much-feared African killer variety. That’s because African killer bees have not been found in Kansas. Although that bee variety has slowly migrated northward from South America and Mexico, it has been seen only as far north as southern Oklahoma.
Salsbury said it’s fairly common for bees to build a hive in a rotting limb of an old tree. However, he said it’s always advisable to leave the hive — and the bees — alone.
“If you need to remove the bees, give a professional a call,” he said. “You can contact your local Extension Service, who, in turn, will probably call me to remove it.”
As for Kendrick, the fact that the hive is mostly gone gives her comfort in knowing that the aging elm tree can finally be brought down.
“This definitely made for an interesting day in our neighborhood,” she said, while standing with a group of other neighbors in her yard.
