Lazy Bees? Lazy Me!

So the small chunks of wood on the front of my hive feeder may apparently not be from small hive beetles. From what I've heard from other beekeepers, is that it probably isn't warm enough yet for small hive beetles in ohio, and that they haven't noticed small hive beetles chewing wood. They remarked that it could be wax moth, though I haven't noticed any white cocoons anywhere. They also said that it could actually be from, and get this . . . lazy bees. Yeah, apparently some bees will chew in to the woodenware if they smell pulp or propolis in the wood. I'd never heard that before. This particular beekeeper said he fixed it by aging his woodenware and coating it in wax. Most my woodenware, except for my hive top feeder has been dipped in paraffin by Queen Right Colonies. So who knows, maybe I've got a couple lazy bees that were in to the taste of wood, or maybe a few rogue moths, or maybe ants, or maybe small hive beetles. I'm not sure I like the idea of lazy bees, though. . . .

I, on the other hand, was quite lazy in my last inspection. I did put on some white karate pants (you know, to better be able to fight back the bees!) No, just kidding, bees like lighter clothing. I wasn't brave enough to inspect in shorts. However, in retrospect, shorts may have saved me from getting stung. I was too lazy to put rubber bands around my ankles to keep bees from crawling up my legs. You see, when you inspect, sometimes bees fall to the ground, and they get curious and start crawling around. Sometimes they end up crawling up your leg. One did exactly this. I could feel it once it got past my sock. I tried to ignore it hoping that it would decide to turn around. Well, once it got up to my thigh/quad, I decided that any further up and a sting might make me quit beekeeping! The bee had reached the point of no return, and evidently the buffness of my quad had made it so that the bee had less room between the pant leg and my leg. And, so I was stung. Of course, it's hard to make sure you got the stinger out in your thigh with pants on, so there was just a quick flurry of itching/scratching and leg shaking. Needless to say, my left quad looks much buffer now and it turned nice and red. The swelling has gone down now, but the redness is still present, about the size of a cantaloupe. Probably didn't help that that morning I had just started running nearly 3 miles after not having excercised for forever. The next day my legs were so sore I could hardly walk. The sting probably exacerbated the situation. In my opinion the sting isn't a big deal. This one hasn't been as bad as the one I got on my finger. The worst part is the itchiness that comes days later. I think that the sting on the finger was more itchy because there was less muscle and more skin. Just like some mosquito bites on your elbow or knee itch more than ones on your calf or back of your arm.

Anyway, next time I'm either wearing my bee suit (this will satisfy my wife, who feels like I wasted the money to buy it if I'm not going to use it much) or I will put rubber bands around the ankles of my karate pants.