12/5/2005: Honeybees build open comb

[Beek]

This is a cool pic!!!! I keep these wonderful little creatures and I'm always excited to see anything about them.

Yes they do on occassion build comb outside of a structure. But it does strongly suggest that they may have some degree of african ancestry. The Italian and Russian stock, even the original "so called native" bees introduced by the first colonists from Germany, do not display this trait.

None the less, I have friends in the lower 48, TX to be precise that have removed bees from these kind of structures and built successful colonies from them.

If you don't know anything about bees though, I would suggest steering clear of a colony like this in the wild. Better safe than sorry. I have close to 100 colonies and work them in shorts and a tee shirt. NO JOKE! But Africans are are totally different critter when it comes to aggression!!

I eats my peas with honey
I've done it all my life
It makes my peas taste funny
But it keeps them on my knife