Bees that killed dog may have been ‘Africanized’
Cape Coral firefighter Ed Agocs was called to the 1400 block of S.W. 53rd Terrace last Thursday, but not to help put out a fire. It’s well known within the Fire Department that he is a licensed beekeeper during his off hours.
His expertise on handling bees was needed to rid the neighborhood of an aggressive bee hive and its occupants that was threatening people and pets. In fact, the agitated bees stung a small dog to death and stung its owner multiple times.
“The hive was in a foxtail palm tree and judging from its age and size it was there about two months,” said Agocs. “With the storm (Matthew) and the weight of the hive and frond, the frond broke and the hive was slapping against the trunk of the tree.”
That made the bees think they were under attack, so, as bees do, they took to stinging in self defense.
“A lady was walking her little dog, about 10-12 pounds, and the bees jumped on them,” said Agocs. “They stung the dog a few hundred times, which was too much for that size dog to survive.”
The dog owner was in the back of an EM ambulance being treated when Agocs arrived on scene. He said she should have gone to the hospital for more treatment and hopes she did.
It is not known if the bees were Africanized or not, but they are prevalent in South Florida. A specific DNA test is required to determine if the bees were Africanized, but it was not done. State rules and regulations lay out what should be done to the aggressive bees.
“The assumption is that because the bees were so vicious that they probably were Africanized and had to be destroyed,” said Agocs. “Another firefighter three houses down from the hive was attacked, too.”
Agocs dressed and approached the hive with a special foam to kill the hive onsite.
“It’s not a long process,” he said. “You want to get rid of them as fast as you can. It was a bad situation for the elderly and you have a dead dog and a lady going to the hospital.”
Cape Coral Police were on the scene and issued an alert to residents around 12:30 p.m., urging them to stay indoors along with their pets until the bees were removed about 3 p.m.
Agocs has managed as many as 250 hives for the past 10 years, and the hive was easy to take care of to make the neighborhood safe again.