Have I ever told you about the bin bees?
A few days ago, Joh ran upstairs after a short walk outside.
‘There are bees in the bin!’ they said. ‘Loads of them!’
I was not delighted by this information. ‘Bumblebees or real bees?’
‘Real bees.’
Oh dear.
‘Nesting?’
‘Maybe!’
They described how they’d gently addressed the bees and carefully lowered rubbish into the bin, and found them still buzzing around industriously on return.
‘But what will we do?’ I asked. ‘How are we going to get bees out of the bin?’
Joh looked sheepish.
‘Joh … we need our bin.’
Joh said, ‘We could get another!’
‘Joh!’
‘Okay.’ Joh went into the kitchen and started clattering around. ‘Step one: befriend the bees. Do we have a tray I can use for water?’
Anyway, Joh went back downstairs with water for the bees, only to return dejectedly.
The swarm had just been investigating the bin and had already moved on before Joh returned.
‘But maybe they’ll live in our bedroom wall, like the bumbles did!’ Joh said hopefully.
We can only hope not. Non-bumblebees are likely to cause a lot more trouble than the bumbles did!
The End.
Note: I know bumblebees are ‘real bees’ but we became very familiar with them and UK bumblebees are very well-named and much better houseguests than other species!