Displaced Beachbums

It was a gorgeous August morning in Germany so FG and I decided to take the dogs for a walk in the forest, something we’d done on countless occasions over the past 3 years. FM was “away” so we drove out to the forest and proceeded to walk along a dirt trail. We were about a half mile from the car, FG and Sport were about 100 yards ahead of me when suddenly, FG turned to me with a look of sheer terror. My first thought was “OMG, she’s found a dead body” and, because she wasn’t moving, I thought she might be in shock. I yelled for her to run to me and that’s when I noticed a dark cloud over her. As she ran, I realized there was a swarm of bees attacking her!

I can’t even begin to describe the adrenaline that surged through me. Needless to say, the dogs were on their own at that point while FG and I ran as fast as we could to the car which was about a quarter of a mile away. The bees were only attacking her, not me or the dogs. We all made it to the car with the bees still swarming and a couple managed to get in the car. I raced the dogs home and headed to the emergency room all the while FG screaming from the pain. 

We stopped counting after 27 bee stings ~ most of which were on her head.  I had one sting on my hand from trying to pull the bees out of her hair and it hurt like heck ~ I can’t imagine the pain she was in. To this day, I dread to think what would have happened if we hadn’t driven to the forest and had walked there ~ the bees would have followed us all the way home, I’m sure.

After the incident, I researched the internet and according to all the descriptions, it sounded like it was africanized bees. Once FG was able to talk about it without crying, she explained Sport had stuck his nose into a hole in the ground and disturbed the hive. It was consistent that the bees only went after one target ~ the dogs didn’t have a single sting.

So far, we’ve not experienced any traumatic animal incidences here in Guam but it is a little disconcerting when FG hums the theme to “Jaws” every time she sees a large fish while snorkeling ~ now that’s a whole different kind of anxiety.