I know ou guys hate this kinda drama but I need some advice.
I have a single bee hive in my back yard along one wall and severl stacks of unused Hive boxs and stuff stacked there too. (A swarm moved into one of those stacks last summer.) I've enjoyed watching them come and go and do their thing. Recently I've noticed that there was a large number of dead bees around the hive. I thought it was because of the cold spells we have been having off and on here in Phoenix and maybe the lack of food. Then a couple days ago I noticed something on the wall. It was a can of bug spray. The naghbor lady and her son have been straying poison on my bee hive and stored Hive equipment. When I confronted her about it yesterday to get her to stop, all she wanted to do was argue and twist my words around. She believes she has a right to do what ever she wants. She wouldn't agree to stop spraying poison on my stuff or listen to me telling her why she shouldn't do that or that she had no right to do so. She ended up calling the cops thinking that they would do something for her.
The cop showed up. got her side of the story. Got my side of the story. I was told that technicly I had the right to sue her for any damage she may have caused and that he would tell her to stop spraying my property. he took a report and left. I know this isn't going to stop her. The cop told her che could spray all she wanted on her property. I dont' think she'd care if she got over spray on my side of the wall.
She's nuts. No, really. She's been fighting with the people on the other side of her since she moved in. She called the cops on them sunday afternoon becaus they were making too much noice and she couldnt' sleep. All they were doing was sitting in their driveway, talking with friends and family and watching their kids play in the front yard. She went out and turned the hose on them. then called the cops to make them be more quiet.
If she is unhappy, she trys to make the people around her unhappy. I've known her my who life just about. She's my best friends Sister who just bought the house next to me a few months ago. I could write a book about all the drama she as caused with the family over the years.
Any advice on how to deal with this would be a help. What options I might explore if legal action is required. Yeah. I know. get a layer. Going in with a plan would be a big help too.
The only proof I have that they poisoned the hive is the can of spray I found and their word that they did it. she admitted it to me when I asked her about it and then again to the cop when he asked her what was going on.
the hive is still alive but I don't know for how long. from what I've seen and from what she said, they have been spraying out there since at least late October. First I noticed anything was late November.
If worst comes to worst and I have to sue her, how do you figure the valoue of bees or the extent of the damage. I don't know exactly what got poisoned and how much. Most of the stuff is old med boxs with empty frames. All the frames were in reusable shape when I stacked everything. I threw away all the bad stuff. There was also a stacm of new Large boxes with drawn out frames I got from a friend who had a hive die on him.
I plan to move the stuff to another part of the yard where it would be harder for her to get to but still, some of those wasp strays shoot 20 feet from the can so it is impossable for me to keep things compleatly out of her reach.
Seems like I have no choice but to assume everything has been poisoned and not reusable. I dont' think a good scrubbing and a fresh coat of paint would remove the poison.
if it was me I would shake the hive down to 1 deep and close entrance, when I seen her come outside I would start hitting the hive with a stick, when she come toward me I would throw it at her then watch opcorn: so the bee's can get revenge also. :applause:
NO,NO,NO Truthfully I would sue her for replacement value (new) for all equipment (not half, you didn't ask for this) plus the bee's you losed plus the time you miss without any bee's and this years harvest from that hive, she is grown and needs to be responsible for her actions. she did it and needs to pay you for it! if you dont get that keep a tab on what she owes, cost her when you can until even, war is nothing, you didn't start it but you can finish it. just dont do nothing to get yourself in trouble unless you can get away with it
a little secret, move the bee's and raise hornets in your yard!!!!
I'm not sure about the hazardous waste clean up. I knew a lady that had a neighbor that sprayed the fence line on their property line and killed one of their trees and the lawn in that area. They contacted police, police wouldn't do anything, civil matter.
They contacted EPA, EPA said since it's on their property, they are responsible for clean up costs. I don't know what eventually happened, but you could end up in a similar situation.
You have the police report. Take her to small claims court. Get a judgement with a time limit for its payment. When it isn't paid, report the judgement, (send a copy with expired time limit,) to all three credit monitoring companies. She will not be able to use her credit card or purchase any major item on credit until she pays you - credit frozen for seven years in our state. She will either pay you or move out of state.
Advice: Unless you are legal with your bees I would be very careful about this coming to the attention of any city bureaucrats. Being on record with the police may not be a good thing if this escalates.
Definitely Not Advice: Give her a large jar of last year's honey and check on how she liked it a few weeks later. Offer her another jar and be sure to say something like "I'm glad you enjoyed it, it came from the bees next to the fence." A little later mention that the bees have never been 'quite the same' since she sprayed and you have no idea what kind of poison was in the spray.
I had this problem once
if it's legal in your area, get chickens
get old english game bantams
get more roosters than hens
they'll crow like crazy at 4:00 AM and the neighbor will move away
then you can have chicken stew and get some sleep
mmmmmmmm
Yeah. there is that old saying about never fighting with stupid people. They will only drag you down to their level and beat you with experiance.
I Went o the store the other night and there were a couple cops parked out front so I thought i'd ask them a few questions about where to go to get a copy of the report and how to file charges if I need to. The cop told me that since the call was a minor demestic despute that there wouldnt' be any report taken. It's not really worth their time he said.
I was working out in the back yard a couple nights ago and they were out in their back yard. They were removing a Bait trap they had made out of a plastic bottle. I guess she figures she can kill the bees that way. Later it looked like they were installing a security cam in the shed. it sounded like they were playing with a signal meter for a wireless camera. This whole deal must be driving her nuts. Tonight I found that bait trap on top of the wall.
I know that her credit has been bad since her devorce about 15 years ago or more. I remembor she got stuck with over 40 grand in Creadit card debt at the time. I also know she's never had more than a dead end job in her life and those dosnt' last more than a few years.
I Did go to Home depot tonight and got a few rolls of that Bamboo privacy screeing that you see in gardens. it's 6 feet tall and I got enough to go around my yard. That would force any bees flying into her yard to fly over it and over her head where she probibly wont' notice them as much.
My next plan in to plant White Dutch clover in the front side yards and the back.
the back yard can wait. I have a project that I've been wanting to do that requires a jack hammer to bust up the old concrete sidewalk that hte bee hives are on now and replace it with pavors. She works nights and sleeps days. I hope she gets her bueaty sleep now because she's going to need it later. I wonder what she's going to be like when the citris trees in her yard are in full bloom.
I thought about chickens. I dont' think it's legal to have chickens where I am but you wouldnt' knwo that from looking around. there are alot of mexicans in my area and alot of them have chickens. I hear the roosters all the time day or night. there was even a rooster in my front yard a few weeks ago making a hell of a lot of noise. I guess it was lost and was looking for the hens. that is something I have thought about thought. I don't know anything about chickens. I'll look into that. I wonder if the neighborhood cats would be a problem. with my luck, she'd find a way to poison the chickens too.
I'll have to check into that when I go to the feed store to look for clover seed. I know they sell chickens, ducks, rabbits and all sorts of other stuff there.
as far as actually going after her, Because I'm so close friends with the rest of her family and still on good turms with them. I think I'm going to have to let the Carma Fairy take care of this one. Maybe I can arrange for some bad Carma to come her way. I got friends who got friends who know that that guy that does that thing with the thing. That shouldn't be a problem. The rest of the time I think I can screw with her head much more affectively than If I actually tried to screw with her openly. It's really easy to play on someones fears once you know what puttons to push. And all you have to do is plant a simple suggustion and let it have time to fester and then next thing ya know they are going nuts being parinoid. She can hate me all she wants. I won't lose any sleep over it.
I will have to clean up the place a little just in case the she calls the city on me. what I need are a couple of lambs to keep the weeds down. maybe I shoud add one of those to the list.
Two lambs, two roosters, 2 hens, 2 hives, one ark. 12 hour CD of Bag pipe music.
Let your hives swarm...sounds like she would freak if a swarm landed in one of her trees....maybe they would even find a nice home in the wall of her house.
Buy a bag of black thistle bird seed and sow it over the wall. Grows good and is nearly impossible to destroy even with constant mowing.
Go to your local garden center and buy a couple of the motion sensing water sprinklers. Set them in the yard so that when she walks near the wall she gets wet.
Get a trail cam and set it up so that if she bothers the hive again you have pictures of it happening for evidence.
Not defending this lady at all. But non-beekeepers
in general have a pretty healthy fear of bees. It
may be irrational, but it's real.
Imagine a constant sortie of bees streaming over your
back yard during a flow............ Bees all over water
sources like pet dishes. Spilled pop........ beer.... etc.
It would have to be unnerving to say the least.
Anything you can do to direct the path away from her
yard is a bonus.
From your description she sounds like her brain is not wired correctly. You have my sympathy. I had one of these two houses away and life was hell. She would put notes on neighbors doors saying that my wife, infant son and I entered her house and rearranged the curtains, etc. The cops would have to show up if she called and said there was nothing they could do. Even the district attorney couldn't do anything because there was a clause in the law that prevented him from taking action if the person calling in a false police report was mentally ill. I got some relief when I threaten her brothers who also owned the house she lived in with a law suit.
If she rents call the land lord and threaten to possible legal action if he renews her lease. If she owns, threaten to move and convert your property to section 8 rental. Tell her you are going to find the scariest section 8 tenants you can find. Then put a big sign in your yard for house for rent "Section 8 OK". Put an add in the paper to so some section 8 people will show up to see the house. Make sure she sees her future potential neighbors. Really if she owns, you might as well move. Life is too short to live next to a nut job.
I have ....severl stacks of unused Hive boxs and stuff stacked there too. (A swarm moved into one of those stacks last summer.)
The AHB is about all we have here in Phoenix. that is why I have been very careful not to mess with the hive until late at night when the bees can't fly around very far.
I am NOT siding with the nut case, and I won't repeat the good advice on how to deal with her, BUT.......
it sounds to me like you are knowingly keeping AHB in your back yard and that seems to me to be asking for problems. I would not be trying to figure out whether or not to sue the neighbor, I would be worried about someone suing me. AHB are not just a danger to those allergic, but small children and pets in the neighborhood as well.
Sheri
I'd ignore any advice about getting chickens, especially roosters to annoy her. Get chickens if and when you want chickens for their own value. Get a rooster if and when you want to wake up at 5 am or earlier every morning.
Kind of like telling a chicken owner with a nut-case neighbor to simply get honey bees to annoy her. Any animal requires its own degree of care and an investment in time, money and learning. There is a very small return on investment when revenge is the ultimate goal.
Do everything listed above to protect your bees, move them, build a fence, keep accurate records of the events...
Then requeen with really gentle stock like cordovans, wait a few brood cycles, walk over to her house with honey and a veil in hand and offer to show her what happens inside that box in your yard. You will most likely be turned down but my hunch is that things will get alot freindlier. You can cuss her all the way back to your house if it makes it easier to swallow.
Take the high road and keep good records.
"The AHB is about all we have here in Phoenix. that is why I have been very careful not to mess with the hive until late at night when the bees can't fly around very far."
If these are AHB then it is your responsibility to get
rid of them ASAP. Nuts as she may be if I lived in
town and the guy over my fence had AHB I'd be
tempted to pick up a bug bomb..........
Bryon......... Are they, or are they not AHB?????
Are they super aggressive??
When I read his discription I did not interpret that he was keeping AHBs. I think what he is saying is that because their is a lot of AHB in the area, people are afraid. So in order to maintain a low profile he works his hive at night when the bees are less active and neighbors will not see a bunch of bees in the air when he opens the hive.
To think that a backyard beek could keep a hive of AHB in a hive in a neighborhood is ludacris. He would not have been able to install the bees himself without killing a dozen neighbors.
She would not been able to pop the top on the bug spray can, much less walk up to the wall. We have all seen footage of AHB research labs.....you can't get within 25 yards of those hives without setting them off.
Byron: for your own protection send a sample into the lab for genetic testing and keep the results filed away somewhere. I don't for a minute believe you have AHBs in your hive, but if you did you need to know for sure because keeping them would be a crime and if they hurt anybody it would be a felony.
When I read his discription I did not interpret that he was keeping AHBs......... He would not have been able to install the bees himself without killing a dozen neighbors.
He says he DID NOT install these, they were a swarm.
Swarms of AHB can be very workable, like any swarm. It is when they get larger they can be a problem.
I am not saying they are AHB, it just seems the OP is suggesting they might be. Perhaps I misconstrued his post, but if in the OP's own words "AHB is about all we have in Phoenix", well, who am I to argue with him? I am just counseling caution, the best route if there is a chance they might be AHB.
Sheri
Avoid advice that could potentially murder your neighbors and subject you to charges of criminal negligence or homicide. A six year old girl in TX was killed by an electric fence that a neighbor put up in their residential neighborhood. He wired it as JB suggests and it killed the girl instantly.
Advice like this needs to come with a warning. There are obviously people that will follow it with tragic consesquences.
This erks me! Why are neighbors such a pain? I have to go back and read all the posts but I couldn't help but say something. I have a problem neighbor too. I'm getting my first bees in April and in the past my neighbor has told me he (in the past ) has killed bees in his yard because he didn't like see them all over his plants. Dahh: scratch: I told him how good they are for us and did not tell him I am getting bees. I am even going to put color on my boxes so he can't see them well.
You, my friend need first to put a sign in her direction "No Transpassing" (Any Attorney will tell you that) and to have a video watch your boxes. Or if you see her in your yard snap a picture and call the police to have her Arrested. Let them take her downtown and see how she likes it behind bars for awhile. I'll loan you one of my Warlock Doberman to tie by your boxes. See how close she wants to come the boxes then.
Another thing, you don't need a real rooster just make a tape of a rooster crowing. Play it in her direction and let her think you have chickens. Make sure it is out of sight so if she comes outside she can't see it. If the police come simply tell them, "No officer I do not have chickens and never have". You won't be lying. There are many ways to cook her goose. The more she asks for it, I'd let her have it. But if you do have African bees you would be smart to get rid of them. They need to be killed but not good honey bees. Are they African? :s
This hive showed up about 6 months ago. It was a swarm that moved into a small stack of hive boxed I have. I assume they have HAB genetics because it's safer to assume the worst that assume nothing is wrong. Thats why I only mess with the hive at night. less chance of problems and more time for the bees to calm down if there is a problem.
This hive has shown no signs of being agressive at all. I've done yard work often enough that if it was I would have known it by now. I'm also out side doing stuff enough that I'd see should see if something is wrong. I've had a hot hive that we kept on a farm about 50 miles away. That one you couldn't bump the hive with out them coming out to see whats going on. We'd knock on the hive a few time then hose down the entrance with a sprayer full of soapy water. when they stopped coming out we'd hit it again and sparay them again until we could bang on the hive all we wanted with out getting a reponce. That one wouldn't take a new queen. They'd requeen themself as soon as they could. We tried every trick we could find. we ended up killing just killing them. Still, even with how annoying they were, they still wen't as mean as the ones you hear about on the news. the wost I've ever see the bees was when we worked that hot hive first and then did the other 11. by the time we were done we had 12 hives of farely pissed off bees. After that we worked the hot hive last and had no issues after that. Nothing a little soap and water didn't fix. They wer still more trouble than they were worth. I was going to take this hive out there too until my friend who I've been bee keeping with desided he's had enough and dosn't want to do it anymore. It's too long of a drive each way for little or no return. I think we have 2 hives left out there. The others died.
If this hive showed any signs of being the least bit aggressive I would have killed it by now. I'm more worried about the other people in the neighborhood than I am the Psycho. I should probibly just get rid of the bees and give up the idea all togather. I don't know what this Psycho will do next. I can't have her doing something stupid and pissing off the hive. she won't be the one who gets stung. it would be someone else who has no idea whats going on.
I'd love to get ahold of some of those nice tempered, demestic bees I keep hearing about. You know the ones. The ones you see in all the bee keeping videos where the guy is working the hive in hive in his bare hands and they produce perfictly drawn out frames.
To hear the old timers talk at the local bee keepers meetings, everyone has AHB to some degree or another now days. The Migratory bee keepers have spread them all over the place. They say you can requeen them but I haven't had any luck at it.
On the bright side of things, I dont' need to get an annoying bird. The Mexican family on the other side of the Psycho has a bird that makes noise all day long. It lives just inside their car port, and right accross from the Psychos bedroom window. between that and their two little Yap dogs that bark at everything, I think I've got the annoying pet angle coverd.
I've got the hive moved to the other side of the house. I've got almost all the other stuff moved.
The Psycho hasn't been seen in several days. Last time I saw her she saw me and went straight back into the hosue. She won't doing anything while I'm around to confront her. If she does anything she'll do it when I'm not around.
After reading about the Clover, It still seems like a good idea even if the bees ignore it. It's supposed to keep other weeds from growing and thats really what I'm after. Something I can let grow and not have to worry about as much. I hate cutting the grass. I'd rather borrow a couple lambs from a friend for a few days at a time and let them eat their fill.
I don't understand people. They will plant things in their yard or garden then complain that they don't like the bugs that they attract. If it wasn't for the bugs, most of those plants wouldn't be around in the first place. They both evolved to depend on ach other to live. Bugs pollenate the plants so they can produce fruit and seed to reproduce themselves. Some Good Bugs eat other Bad bugs that would eat the plant and cause it not to grow. Some ugly bugs that no one likes turn into pretty bugs that everyone likes. Look at Butterflies. Lady bugs. what are you going to do? squash all the ugly bugs?
My advice for people like the psycho that moved in next to me is this, if you don't like flies, don't crap in your yard. But if you build your home next to a dairy, don't complain about the flys. She knew I had bees before she even bought the house.
Like you asked - "what are you going to do? squash all the ugly bugs?"
You live in a neighborhood of the city which it appears is changing demographics to the types of people who you can't tolerate. My advice: Move! (or invite them all over for a BBQ, and get to know them better!)
My place in the country is pure heaven , I tell 'ya...
If you have the can of bug spray if she used it in a manner inconsistant with its labeling you could probably have her fined for that as well when you take her to court
I had a great great uncle who had problems like you are having you may have hear of him, his name was Randall McCoy. This Hatfield fellow and him did not see I eye to eye. Hope if works out for you. Fueding is in my blood I would have a good time driving her even more nuts!
Seriously, you have to try hard to be a good neighbor so others don't have reason to attack you. If you tuck your bees in somewhere they aren't as noticeable yet not near the boundry line, keep your yard neat, no junk all around, cut the clover and all your grass so they can't complain. No swearing at or vulgarness to them. When/if the police come be calm, let them see you are not the problem. This lady has crossed the line and needs to pay for her actions. She had NO right to harm your property and press that while improving on yourself. Wish you the best ! :applause:
Every village seems to have an idiot! God bless you for not punching her in the throat i don't think i could have been that patient,i too have a lunatic neighbor,but im blessed as she is lazy as can be and sleeps most all day, (on our dime the taxpayer) but i don't trust her as far as i can throw her and the wife's little yippy dog will let me know if someones is close to the fence,then i let my German Shepard out and that seems to solve problems with nosey nelly. If you can id move the apiary,buy a video camera and a chihuahua,good luck.
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