Stolen Hives

[kc in wv]

A beekeeping buddy of mine called me with some bad news. He had a hive at a friends house all summer. Last week the friend had taken a few days vacation and when he got back the house had been broken into.

The burglar had also taken newspapers and smoked up my buddy's hive until all of the bees was dead and they took all of the frames of honey and the 9 brood frames, leaving only the boxes.

My buddy said they might have got more than they bargined for. He had already put on 2 treatments of Teramycin, put in Checkmite strips, and had been feeding the bee's corn syrup since there was little nectar flow this year.

Of course if they get sick they will probably try to sue him

[Aspera]

I think that hive theft is a new low in criminality. I just hope that its not other beeks doing it. Maybe that's the one positive to AHB...It cuts down on vandalism and theft.

[mwyatt]

On one hand I hope a beek would not be a burglar. On the other hand he took the brood which makes you wonder. Maybe we should design a dye pack like they use in banks with the bait money. Pull the brood box and get dyed.

[BjornBee]

Just in the past few months I have heard....

A beekeeepr lacing feeders with poison to cleans the area for breeding purposes.

I have heard of bad advertising or misrepresentation of brood boxes on sale in the dakotas.

I have heard of honey being swapped/replaced with water.

Someone here was making statements about an apparent untruthful beekeeper jumping the rooftops with frames of honey in new york.

I believe someone is still waiting for money from a honey straw machine.

Barry needs rules and guidelines in place for a simple "honey swap", due to potential abuses.

Those are just off the top of my head.

You can hope all you want about it not being another beekeeper. But tell me who, other than another beekeeper, would even go near a hive, let alone know how to smoke, kill, and take the frames. So, will AHB's do any good. No.

[mthopebee]

Oh Lordy Even on here we are now getting a FEAR FACTOR ....... Get out the duct tape and plastic .....

[BjornBee]

Fear factor? Nah. Just a reality check.

Glenn Beck fan I take it... ;)

[Maine_Beekeeper]

Bjorn - yep, there's dishonest people out there, And with over 4600 users, chances are, they're "in here" too.
Fortunately most of the stories you hear here are much more positive.
I've had a few good turns done to me via this posting and done a couple myself. I've sent honey via the honor system of the Exchange and I've received honey in return.
Yep, we hear of and experience in our beekeeping and other respects of our lives a few real Bums.

And you're right - just being a beekeeper doesn't make one a good person.

I like to think that we're working to build a community here that doesn't participate in that stuff and helps to warn others of it. I'll let you be in my dream if I can be in yours.

[bee whisper]

Aman!Do unto others as you would have done unto you!Simple words if man could only live by it.

[naturebee]

--The burglar had also taken newspapers and smoked up my buddy's hive until all of the bees was dead and they took all of the frames of honey and the 9 brood frames, leaving only the boxes.--(KC)

I don't quite understand the 'smoking till dead" procedure. How exactally o you think this was done?

[HarryVanderpool]

I had a couple of hives shot up this fall.
Check out:
http://orsba.proboards27.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=display&thread=1159938438

[kc in wv]

>>>I don't quite understand the 'smoking till dead" procedure. How exactally o you think this was done?

I would expect that a knowledgeable beekeeper would recognize the checkmite strips and powdered sugar/terramycin treatment and realize that any honey they got wasn't safe to eat. I expect whoever did this knew you was supposed to smoke the bees but didn't know how. They inturn put the burning paper in the entrance and the heat and fumes killed the bees.

Whatever or whomeever they are, they got smoky corn syrup laced with CheckMite+™ and Terramycin

[buz]

Heck-and I use the empty suppers stacked around as sentries. Keeps all but the least observant at bay. Don't have many travelers about - but they keep their distance.
Peace

[chillardbee]

a freind of mine had his bees up in the mountians for the fireweed and upon returning after a couple of weeks found 1 colony (out of the 30 that were up there)to be missing a top super and lid. those supers were full at the time and i think who ever it was thought that it wasn't worth the effort to take more, i'm pretty sure that wasn't another beek. still was a low act though.

on another occasion the same fella had a yard of 35 hives that were just requeened with 'bee master queens' from Connecticut (this was early 90's) and was saddened that most queens didn't take and the hives were starting new queen cells. i remember what they looked like as i was with my freind when we went through them and out of the ones that were left the queens were beautiful black queens marked with a baby blue dot on the thorax. around this time my dad and i were expanding our own operation and heard of a beek that was selling out located not very far from the yard of my freind. we inspected the colonies and seen a few queens, beautiful black queens with a baby blue dot...

[ScadsOBees]

Look at the bright side -- maybe the terramycin will cure the infections the thief has (gum disease?), the checkmite will get rid of his intestinal worms and lice and he will finally be able to get a job and be a contributing member of society!

I too doubt he's a beek...otherwise he'd have taken all the boxes too. Just somebody who knows that smoke calms bees(then kills them).

I did have correspondance with somebody who sells stuff to beeks and says they are all honorable. Every barrel has some bad apples as much as we'd like to think ours don't.

-rick

[AstroZomBEE]

Actually when stealing bees, the box is the most undesirable item, being the easiest to trace and hardest to reuse. Sometimes people will plaster over our brand and try to sell the boxes. But probably just transfer the bees and brood into thier own boxes and burn the stolen ones.

We have had a few instances of major theft, once we actually found a guy with our stuff, but he concocted a story that he bought our equipment from some "young kid". Resulting in no charges.


Our last major instance was Back around 2000 we had around 300 nucs stolen. Somebody cut the chain, drove through the gate and loaded everything up and left. Didn't draw anyone's attention probably becuase it was another beekeeper with a truck and loader, who looked like he belonged there.

This year we had 2 pallets of bees stolen on location in Maine.

Just like cops, there are Dirty Beekeepers everywhere. hah, that was just a joke.
I don't know any dirty cops.

AstroZomBee