Owners of the Sequim Bee Farm are looking for answers after they say vandals poisoned 20 of their hives, killing upward of 300,000 honey bees, The Peninsula Daily News reported Wednesday.
“We knew a bear wouldn’t just stop pushing over with all the honey in the hive,” Sequim Bee Farm co-owner Buddy Depew told the newspaper. “I got to looking, and the rest of the hives, the bees, were all gone.”
Bees are the world's most important pollinators, and winter is already a tough season for bees.
In addition to frigid temperatures, honey bee colonies must battle disease and parasites.
When outside temperatures fall below 55 degrees, bees form a "winter cluster," packing tightly together and vibrating their wing muscles to keep warm.
At the Washington State University Teaching Apiary, where workers labor to keep bees alive, people ensure that every hive is raised off the ground and every entrance angles downhill to drain rainfall and prevent rotting.
They also install wire mesh screens in the entrances to ensure mice can't come inside.
WSU entomologists keep more than 200 hives on the Pullman campus and on surrounding properties in Washington and Idaho.
Get breaking news alerts anytime with the KIRO 7 News App
Cox Media Group
