Bee removal sounds so much simpler than it really is.  Mom and Dad had no idea what they were in for, but it sure made me glad I’m still a kid.  Ten-year-olds don’t have to mess with that kind of stuff.  Yuck!

            We had no idea we had a problem at first.  I was just out in the backyard kicking my soccer ball around one day (I was really throwing rocks over the fence into the neighbor’s fish pond, but don’t tell Mom and Dad that, okay?), and I saw a bee fly right past my head, towards the shed.  I followed it, thinking it was pretty cool.  It landed at the bottom of one of the wood slats and crawled right through a little crack and disappeared. 

            Throughout the whole summer, week after week, I watched bees coming in and out of the shed wall.  I’d keep track of which field they flew off to.  Sometimes, I’d pick some of our other neighbor’s flowers and stick them near the hole, just to see if the bees would land on them.  Sometimes they did and sometimes they didn’t.  I didn’t tell Mom and Dad.  I just didn’t think they’d be interested.  Guess I should’ve said something.  Oh, well.

            One Saturday, Dad came out and headed out to the shed to grab some weed killer.  I was actually kicking the soccer ball around that day, and I told him he might want to watch out for the bees.  He had no idea what I was talking about, so I showed him.  He sat there with me and watched the hole for a while, and it looked like he was getting more and more worried and kind of mad.  I hoped he was mad at the bees and not me.

            Yep, he was mad at the bees all right, and he got even madder when he called for bee removal and found out there was a whole huge swarm of bees living right there in our backyard.  Dad made me go inside when the bee removal guys showed up, but I could see everything from the back window. 

            They had to pull the wall apart, and I could see Dad gag a little.  Later, he said it was an awful smell, because some bees had died and were just rotting in there.  I guess some mice had crawled in there because of the smell of the wax and honey, and died, so they were rotting, too.  Mom kind of turned white, when Dad talked about that part, and only said she was glad they weren’t in the walls of our house.  That would’ve been nasty!

            They’ve cleaned everything out now, removed all the bees and stuff, and filled the hole back up.  We had to rebuild the shed a little bit.  Dad told me to tell him whenever I see bees crawling into the shed or our house.  Kinda cool that I have an important job now!