Run! Scream! Pray!
A man from the county buzzed up to our front door the other day to warn us about killer bees.
Actually, he was warning us about killer mosquitoes but the pamphlet he gave us was about the bees.
These are the African queenies that were crossbred with European honeybees 40 years ago to create a bee that could tolerate hot weather.
What emerged instead was a tough little sucker with the innocent appearance of an angel and the instincts of a serial killer. Think of the Night Stalker crossbred with Mary Lou Retton.
The bees escaped from a laboratory in Brazil and have been headed this way ever since, killing and terrifying along the way.
That they will someday appear in our midst comes as no surprise. Everything weird and dangerous eventually ends up in L.A.
The man at my front door was from the county’s West Vector Control District. He had spotted our fish pond and insisted that we acquire fish that would eat mosquito eggs because mosquitoes spread diseases.
But the pamphlet he handed me had nothing to do with mosquitoes.
It warned us to “Bee alert” for killer bees and featured a cartoon bee character with a scowl on its face and four fists doubled up in a fighting pose.
No jeopardy in L.A. is ever without a cartoon character. Remember Quirky Quake? He was the cheerful cool dude who warned us about earthquakes until a real one came along and made funny little figures seem inappropriate.
Now we have Buzzy Bee telling us that his killer cousins are on their way and we’d better bee ready for them.
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We don’t need this. After fires, floods, earthquakes, slides, gangs, mountain lions and cute black bears that invade our hot tubs, killer bees seem an unnecessary addition to the perils of urban life.
When I telephoned the West Vector Control District to inquire about the nasty little buzzers, I was told not to worry, the bees are still in Blythe and don’t seem to want to leave.
Blythe is in Riverside County about 230 miles east of L.A. at the foot of the Big Maria Mountains. Why the bees seem attracted to Blythe is beyond me. I’ve been there and couldn’t wait to leave.
Bee experts think that they will reach here about spring and the areas they will likely head for will be quieter rural regions at a reasonable distance from highways and freeways. They hate noise and vibrations.
I happen to live in a quiet rural region at a reasonable distance from highways and freeways and I am not happy about the idea of killer bees moving into the neighborhood, despite our mutual aversion to noise and vibrations.
Television producers and actors are bad enough, but at least they don’t strike in swarms. Killer bees are different. I’ve read that 1,000 or more will attack at once and that healthy adults can stand up to 1,500 stings before the attack is lethal.
However, counting the stings during the assault is probably not advisable. Run, screaming and praying, to the nearest enclosure and leave the calculating until later.
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When I asked our Topanga bee man, Alex Wright, what to do about the bees, he said, “Try not to piss them off.”
He’s had 20 years experience dealing with bees generally and, in fact, once rid our yard of a wasp’s nest. He loves ordinary honeybees but holds no affection for their killing cousins.
“The difference between an ordinary bee and a killer bee,” he said darkly, “is the difference between a garden snake and a rattler.”
I’ve had some experience with dangerous bees having seen a television movie produced by the late Bruce Geller, “Attack of the Killer Bees.”
The movie was aired in the 1970s, years before the bees entered California, and everyone laughed at Geller’s contention that they would be a danger.
He had the bees invading a town just about the size of Blythe and stinging everyone to death. Neither screaming, running nor praying were enough to save anyone. The bees got them all.
As it turned out, Geller may have been far ahead of his time.
The bees are actually in Blythe, making plans to move to L.A. The man from the West Vector Control District said if they should invade my quiet, rural, vibration-free neighborhood I’d better seal off my home and get rid of any discarded containers, like old water heaters.
I don’t have any old water heaters lying around and our house is virtually unsealable, but I’m constantly on the alert now for anything that buzzes.
Our bee man is less concerned. “Don’t worry about bees,” he said, “worry about getting killed on the 405.”
He’s got a point.
Al Martinez can be reached on the Internet at al.martinez@latimes.com
