What you see here is a rough transcript of the audio that is on this page. It was from the start of a podcast series that we will be picking back up soon.
We will be cleaning up the transcript so that it makes sense to read.
[Intro]
Jeff: (:37)
Hello guys, Some of the most interesting jobs over the last several years have been usually the ones that are the ones that stand out because their unique and where the hives located.
Louis and I were talking the other day and he says, “What jobs really stick out? and I say, “Well there’s there’s a couple that just jumped out at me.” I said, “the Hyatt Grand Regency downtown on the FAA lights at the top, they had bee swarms on both ends of that building.
This is going back for quite a few years ago, about 2006, somewhere in that range. I got a call down there by the maintenance department and they said that they had to do some work up on the top of the building for those lights. And they couldn’t get near them because of a bee swarms was it.
Which is amazing because the building is over 22 stories tall and then that’s of course above the 22nd floor. It’s the big roof that’s kind of at an angle.
So we pulled up into the loading docks and it took us about 3 hours to get all of our gear and everything at the top of the building to do the work. We ran over, I think it was about 280 feet or 300 feet of cable because we had to vacuum the bees up, because of where they are located and they didn’t want to spray any pesticides they prefer to take them out without the use of any chemicals. So anyway, me and another guy we carried about 100 lb of cables and ran it up to the top of the building, and we vacuumed up bee swarms off both ends the FAA lights and I have to say, What an incredible view when you’re up there.
But what’s really impressive is when you get to the top of that building, it looks like it’s a really narrow because of the sheer size of the building but when you get up there it’s actually only about probably it’s about 8 feet wide 6 to 8 feet wide from side to side. So it’s just like a little tiny corridor and you walk down and you go to the ends. The lights at the top are actually pretty big are about 12 inches roughly, give or take. But they look like little pin drops from the ground because it’s so high off the ground.
How did that job come about? (2:50)
It was called in by the maintenance department. They had to do some maintenance up on the top of the building because they had to get the lights cleaned or whatever and I have to make sure I think they probably have annual maintenance requirements because they are for airplanes to keep them from hitting a building because it’s so high up and so it’s probably more than likely it’s probably a requirement. They were up there trying to do to maintenance and the guys saw the bees flying around and so what we got the call.
Remember that hotel where the maintenance guy was using a DIY bee suit? (3:50)
You guys are going to love this. We go up to the top and we’re up there by this guys maintenance office and he said, “Yeah, we try to do it our self.” He comes out and he has a cardboard box as a little cut out little slit for the eyes and a little area for the mouth. And then what he did was he he put some of that screen, that screening material that you use for your front door on your house at it’s like a vinyl material and he taped it on her with duct tape then he taped the plastic bags to the bottom of the box.
Then he took the box and he put it on his head and then he went up there and try to do it himself. I said, “what what happened?”
He said,”we got stung like about 7 or 8 times trying to do it our self. We thought it was pretty funny story. Actually, Louis thought it be funny to go ahead and show it so we did a little blog on a DIY bodysuit and we got a ton of interested people, one guy responded by saying “Holy Cow Batman!”
You can also go on the YouTube channel which is actually I think it’s #2 now, most viewed video on your YouTube. (5:15)
Haha, yeah the viewer thought they were going to go in there to get some real useful information. they didn’t know it was a spoof on a bee suit. It was just us showing what what lengths they’ll go to, to try to do it themselves.
These stories are important to help people with the do’s and the dont’s of bee removal. Let’s keep telling people these stories. (6:00)
Yeah, you’ve seen what other people are doing and what they’ve tried. I’ve gone up to peoples homes when they are wearing a wet suit. Because it’s like a quarter inch foam like material. The bee stinger won’t touch your skin. And I’ve had people wearing that. And they go, “I will just throw on my wet suit on and I’ve got goggles, ski gear and I’ll throw my motorcycle helmet.”
I go up there and wearing all the stuff, haha! and last minute they’re realizing, “Okay, I’m getting ready to go into this bee hive and try to do it myself. I’m not really sure if this is going to work, maybe I might want to call Professional.”
But just the fact that you know they’re going to Great Lengths and you see what they’re willing to do it’s kind of amazing to me that people actually do that.
(7:03)
well you know if there’s an unknown there you know they have to experience it for themselves, (Laughter)
well this is a quite a while ago we were me and another gentleman we were working on a beehive in Point Loma area it was up in a tree and it was a size of one of those large inflatable beach balls it’s about maybe 24 inch round maybe even a little bit bigger than that and it was hanging up in a tree and we set up too loud as we settle ladder up for ourselves so that we can attack from two different angles and we laid down the plastic and got everything prepped on the grounds were going to cut the hive out of the tree and drop it wrap it and bag and get it out of there well I told the helper that we need to tie this off so it doesn’t just drops it when we cut it we can just gently lower it down and maintain control The Hive but he started cutting and getting ahead of himself and anyway he cut the branch and a way to the hive snapped the other branch and half and I’m talking about two-and-a-half 3 inch Branch just cracked in half the thing ended up waiting about eighty-five 90 lb roughly give or take it had been there for a year or two and when I hit the ground we never stinging us right to our suits I drop down off that ladder ran to the truck wrapped another suit through it on needless to say I wasn’t too happy but we we got control of it but that but that was a memorable time and I was actually about back in ninety-one or ninety-two much it stuck in my head
and it was after that time I said I ain’t working with that guy ever again
not those are those are pretty cool stories and you like you know you can always think back to those things those moments like when you’re in another situation similar and you’re like I recall this moment right
what’s interesting it seems like all the time for things go horribly wrong it seems like those moments really sticking your head forever you know it was another time we had to go pick up some high boxes from this whole retire beekeeper out in the Mesa right there off of 70th Street again was an early 90s 900 exhaust work with the same guy was it seem like we work together and everything went to hell in a handbasket so to speak but anyway we had like three or four of them on the truck and I said we should tie them off and take them at the seams to keep it all secure and keep it from tipping over and for whatever reason that you just wanted you said you know we don’t need to do that just a waste of time we get back to the yard and one or two of The Hive tipped over and we had all of our gear back there and we ended up getting stung by it was three of us in the truck we took over a hundred things between us
dark loves helmets in Vails so you got to take every precaution you can you got to make sure everything is taped off you got to make sure everything’s tied when you’re dealing with life because you want to make sure that your load secure but you know that that’s why it’s so important to take the extra time to make sure that everything’s set up in a way that nothing can go wrong
so how many times have you gotten stung?
I think that was the worse, I think around 30 times I got stung.
all of us we took about a hundred staying so yeah I got stung on my on my head in my hands mostly in my hands but so would you go back to work the next day
I don’t know there were times I come back to work the next day. I look like a clown from The Circus with a big round nose my eyeballs be all swollen shut and you know how I was a young man and it was different back down but you know my boss would laugh at me you know you see me coming and he would go let me see that nose…haha
I remember that the most painful sting that I received I was actually on a job I was about 17 where in Coronado and this guy had a bumblebee Nest underneath of a shed and we had to cut a piece of wood out of the edge of the shed in order to reach under there and scrape the nasty out and the owner of the company his older son didn’t want to do it he told me to reach under there and I reach under there even though I had gloves on they stung me through the glove on my forearm and it just what it felt like a burning it set my alarm on far as like a burning stinging sensation I came running out of the backyard literally crying it was so painful I was young young teenager at the time and that stuck in my mind I remember after that I really didn’t want to do anymore bumblebee jobs but their Stingers a lot larger than a honey bee stinger plus they can sting repeatedly over and over again
what are some of the things that the average person can do to prevent themselves from being canoe getting that sting well I think the most important thing is being aware of your surroundings when people are out and they’re working in the yard be aware of anything flying around the guard now I’m in the lot of times you’ll see flowers and trees was it has blooms on it and a bezel P pollinating the flowers or the plants but when you see a really heavy concentration of beef light activity than you want to pay closer attention and see if there’s maybe not going into a knothole of the tree or if there’s a squirrel den in the ground and they have not taking it over and they’re building a hive underground irrigation boxes of real commonplace they like to set up high so if you have anything that has a space or void to it whether it’s a retaining wall block wall irrigation box or something of that sort or even a hose reel where they could get up underneath it and build a hive then you want to be aware of that and if you notice to be sliding in and out of it and it’s heavier than usual then you definitely don’t want to try to do what you yourself Corner professional don’t bust out to DIY bee suit you know it’s really not worth taking the risk specially with use African bees
so you don’t you know how people are getting real fearful of bees when they’re interact I’m right people just slap them away or just one or two right now what can I do with that help set off the larger population of bees in the area
because a lot of times and then that person swing your arm around where are still taking the pheromones in the Stinger the scent gland in the stinger and then when you when you when you crushed it your stomping on and they see how many smack him on the ground they step on them they’re putting that alarm pheromone in the air and I can draw more be used to start attacking that person wow so you know that’s why I told me what you just get out of the area don’t don’t start feeling your arms around swinging your arms wildly because I just try to get out of there as quickly as you can
we had about a hundred fifteen hundred twenty foot cable crane was kind of just lowers down and got a man basket and you basically it’s just enough room for one man to get in the basket and then the train goes up over the top of the cell tower Ned lowered us down between the building and actual backside of the cell tower and we we we ended up on screwing the the screws that were holding these panels they were a fiberglass foam type material so they weren’t real heavy but they had insulating factor and and it also protected the electronic equipment of backside of the cell tower in abusive gotten in there and they built the about a 40 or 50 pound Hive inside of there and they were doing some work on it the cellular company need to get in there and they had they had two hives one on each end two or three and anyway we ended up having a guy that was lowered down in there and he actually had to pull the panels off they wait about 45 50 pounds I mean they weren’t light but for the size of them they weren’t as heavy as you think but but he actually got it all cleaned out we spend an entire day on it and that’s pretty impressive cuz you think about the fact that he had no control of the of the phone basket and he’s up there with live fees and he’s basically giving hand signals to the crane operator where he wants to ask it to be
free free danglingwhat an interesting is I mean you got to realize there was like a hundred fifteen feet tall so every little incremental move would make that basket move around because it was on a cable you know it would it would go it would swing back and forth before it came to stop you have to grab onto the sides and hold on to the fiberglass wall or the edge of the building to stop it from moving
when you do it every day and you’ve done it most of your life you just kind of it just becomes normal and Andy and you don’t really think there’s anything too special about until you start telling people about a particular job and you you you should see the look on her face and and they’re telling you man. You couldn’t pay me enough money to do that job and you’re thinking why don’t the heights part I understand you know people have a risk of Heights or fear of heights and I understand that and there’s always some risk associate if you don’t if you’re not careful
