3 Dogs in Critical Condition After Honey Bees Attack

In Ventura County California 3 dogs were in critical condition this week after a swarm of bees attacked Balcom Canyon Pet Lodge – a pet boarding center located near an orchard in a rural area. 16 dogs who were boarding there at the time were playing outside after breakfast Wednesday when workers spotted what looked like a giant plume of smoke in the distance. As it approached, they realized it was a swarm of bees, which officials now believe to be of the Africanized variety.



The swarm of bees came down in the exercise yard and began stinging dogs and employees. A dozen dogs were stung. Three — two whippets and a Cairn terrier — are hospitalized in critical condition. The whippets were stung more than 250 times and appeared unrecognizable. This Bee attack was strange because of how aggressively the bees responded. Usually, Africanized bees will buzz around the countryside without disturbing anyone. Africanized bees can be more aggressive, they chase targets for longer distances and larger amounts of the hive tend to attack if provoked or upset then their non Africanized counterparts.



Heat becomes a major problem for all bees. They will send out many more foraging bees to gather and bring back water than they would ordinarily do for pollen and nectar in the cooler months. They may work hard to bring back as much as a gallon of water an hour to fan and cool the honey comb to support the development of the young and keep their honeycomb and honey stores from melting down. This will cause a state of agitation in individual bees and anxiety in the colony. With more bees out, and a greater amount of guard bees set out for defense, bad things are more likely to happen if the colony is disturbed. Which is what is believed to have happened in this case. Experts believe that the bees were extremely angered by something that happened to their hive and therefore more aggressive then normal.