13 Yellow Jacket Bees!

My brother and I had several more encounters with bees. Once we were digging for worms so we could go fishing. We were at Clear Lake, California and found a small creek that fed into the lake. We were alarmed when our shovel hit a Yellow Jacket nest. Out charged the angry yellow jackets and away Richard and I ran.

Yellow Jackets were swarming all around us and Richard was stung. I headed for the cabin we were staying in; with my brother right behind me. About half way to the cabin, I saw a barbed wire fence! The thought raced through my mind that we would have to slow down to crawl through the fence and the angry Yellow Jackets would have no trouble catching up with us.

Just then a wonderful idea came into my mind and I stopped dead in my tracks; took two quick steps and hid behind one of the big trees that we were running through. I stood perfectly still, but yelled at my brother, "Hide behind a tree!" Evidently my brother did not have the same inspiration that I had and ran right by me to the fence. All of the Yellow Jackets followed him. I guess they like moving targets. He was stung 3 or 4 times as he climbed through the fence and a couple of more times between there and the cabin. Of course he was screeming all the way. It was kind of funny and I laughed, but not where mom could hear me.

This same experience happened a couple of other times in our lives. Richard always ran and got stung and I always stood still or ducked behind a bush or tree. The bees or Yellow Jackets always followed Richard.

Lesson Learned

I'm not sure what ones learns from this experience other than sometimes when danger is around it is best to stand behind the protection of a tree and not move. Then again, maybe it means that we ought to go through life with our brother near by. Richard and I had a lot of fun together; except when ther were bees around.