A particularly aggressive species of honeybee has been threatening parts of America, with some people getting stung so many times that they have had to go to hospital.
In the past week, an 84-year-old man from Arizona was stung more than 2000 times in his backyard and three dogs have been killed. 500 stings from these bees is the equivalent to one bite from a rattlesnake.
Experts are pointing the finger at the Africanised honeybee, also known as the killer bee, for the attacks. It is a crossbreed between the European honeybee and the African honeybee.
The bees are most common in warm Southwestern states such as Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. If their hives are disrupted, they became very aggressive.
Experts can not pinpoint an exact reason for the increase in bees this year, but believe the change was caused by the wet, warm winter Arizona experienced this year.
The bees are constantly on guard for possible threats to the hive. The colour of a shirt or the scent of perfume could all be seen as threatening, It doesn’t take much to provoke them these bees as they hate any movement, noise or vibration.
The sizes of the hives and swarms varied, but the hive usually contains 40,000 to 60,000 bees.
16 Responses
Wow so deadly
who scary I hope they don’t come to NZ
wow I would not want to get stung by them
omg
omg
That would be so scary
that sounds like a cartoon (Breaking news killer bee’s have gone on a rampage over USA.)
wow!!!
i hope they don’t come to NZ!
i feel sorry for the people that got stung
Wow I hate this
😮
CRAY CRAY
So sad for the people hope they get better soon 🙁
Uh oh 😮
that is soo sad for the people who got sting but the bee popution is decresing
poor dogs 🙁