Bee Colonies
WHAT IS AN AFRICAN BEE COLONY? HOW DOES AN AFRICAN BEE COLONY DAMAGE YOUR HOME AND RUIN YOUR PROPERTY VALUE?
As the African bee swarm arrives, all 8,000 to 12,000 bees immediately begin to urinate and smear their individual pheromone scent on the exterior surfaces of that structural cavity. Often, they will ball up briefly on the outside of the entrance to the structural cavity. This is because not all of the enormous amount of bees can "scramble in through the entrance at one time". After the necessary time for the bees to enter the cavity, it literally appears to a lay person, that the colony has "disappeared" or "left" or " removed on", however, by then the entire group of African bees has already done significant damage to that structure by "marking it" with special bee pheromone substance, called the Nasanov bee pheromone, so the individual honey bees are able to find their home when returning from a bee foraging flight which will often be at least 3 miles away. Also, the Nasanov pheromone scent that the African worker bees urinate and smear liberally on the exterior and interior surfaces of the structural cavity, unless treated properly will cause future bee infestations to occur.
Immediately on arrival, the African worker bees begin excreting beeswax from their glands and start building honeycomb structure, they do this very quickly. Some of the African worker bees begin foraging for pollen, nectar and water and the queen is positioned in the comb and begins laying eggs. An African queen bee can lay up to 1000 plus eggs a day, and the first bee brood will begin emerging in 19 days. It is common for African honeybees to build 3 or 4 pieces of hanging honeycomb structure within the first 24 to 48 hours after arrival. Much structural damage can be avoided, if a newly arrived African bee colony is removed during this critical period.
Honeycomb is filled with bee brood and condensed honey in the honeycomb cells. The honeybees work very hard to condense and maintain the honey and keep it intact. If extermination is improperly performed and the bee colony is damaged or if the honeycomb is not removed quickly, honeycomb will immediately start melting down, called honeycomb meltdown, and ferment and the bee brood will rot furthering the structural damage. Also, dripping honey and melting honeycombs carry heavy pheromone content which then spreads further throughout your building structure.
