Killer bees begin to plague Strip, McCarran

Thursday, June 15, 2000 | 11:23 a.m.

State and local experts are bracing for July when Africanized bees are expected to create new nests and new hazards -- even in some favorite vacation spots.

And although Las Vegas Valley's insect controllers say they are ready to handle the problem, an increasing number of the aggressive honey gatherers are showing up in popular tourist areas such as the Strip and at the airport.

At least 25 nests of the Africanized bees have been cleared away from Strip resorts in the past year, said Gina Stoneking, bee coordinator for the Nevada Division of Agriculture. "And that's only what we know about, because the pesticide companies turn them in to us, but not all of them," she said.

The bees cluster on the sides of hotels, cracks in walls, around water or near picnic tables. A recent nest had settled on a crane at the Wet 'N Wild water park at Sahara Avenue and Las Vegas Boulevard South.

The bees also have taken a liking to McCarran International Airport, where they have swarmed onto the sides of jetliners, into engines and on the tarmac.

The Africanized bees love the same places people settle because of food, water and sugar supplies, state Agriculture Administrator Paul Iverson said.

"Bees will eventually determine that the Strip is a prime vacation area," Iverson said. "As our population continues to grow, those bees will continue to come."

Instead of creating a new hive every year like European honeybees, the Africanized variety develops new nests seven times a year.

There is no method to rid an area of this bee species, once its established, Iverson said. "We have to learn to live with them, and we will because they are here to stay."

The bees became a problem in the Las Vegas Valley in May 1998. The first nest was discovered in Laughlin and by August the bees had moved along the Colorado River to Boulder City, Henderson and Las Vegas, leaving a trail of dead snakes, rabbits and birds in their wake, Iverson said.

There has been no deaths reported in Nevada from the honeybees, popularly known as "killer bees," because pest controllers and resort maintenance crews have spotted and destroyed swarms wherever they have nested, officials said Wednesday.

When the Africanized insects crossed the Mexican border into Texas in 1990, the border town of Hidalgo turned the event into a tourist attraction, erecting a statue to the bees. Tourists take their pictures in front of the killer bee.

Two people in Las Vegas have been attacked. A 77-year-old woman stung 500 times in an attack during March is lucky to be alive, American Pest Control General Manager George Botta said. The bees have killed 1,000 people in South American since they escaped from a laboratory in Brazil.

"It's like a sci-fi movie out there sometimes," Botta said of the 400 nest removals he has done wearing a suit that looks like an astronaut's.

In 21 years of pest control Botta said he normally answered one bee call every year or two. On Wednesday, Botta said he had to refer a call or two because his six Africanized bee experts were busy all over the valley.

Gov. Kenny Guinn earlier this month called for a statewide task force on what to do about the bees now that they are here.

The task force is not expected to meet before mid-July, state Emergency Management Chief Frank Siracusa said.