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© Copyright 1997, Jim Loy
This essay is a warning to you folks who try to shoo away stinging insects by swatting at them. Knock it off! This little critter wasn't going to sting anyone. And now it's fighting mad, because you flailed at it with greater than aerobic intensity. And now it's going to sting me. I can only hope that you smoke cigarettes, so you will die a very unpleasant death.
Stinging insects (bees and wasps) can kill you. But they probably will not. Essentially, you must be allergic to the sting for it to cause you a great deal of harm. I was once stung on the top of my head, which caused fever and swelling around my eyes for a while. The main problem with stings is that they hurt.
These little critters are just trying to go about their jobs, collecting nectar and feeding themselves. They are not looking for someone to sting. So, when they buzz around your mouth or crawl on you, it is done with no evil intent. And non-violent actions (or inaction) can usually get them to move on. Unfortunately, accidents happen. Stepping on a bee is judged to be an attack, and you will probably be stung.
A bee (the bumble bee is a species of bee) normally dies after stinging. The end of the bee's abdomen is ripped out, along with the stinger. You continue to get poison from the stinger, so you should scratch the stinger out of your skin. Wasps (the yellow jacket is a species of wasp) do not die, when they sting, and can sting you over and over.
Killer bees are a hybrid of honey bees and african bees. Someone crossbred these to get a more vigorous bee. Success. These gang up on people, mainly beekeepers, in order to protect the hive. They produce little honey, and you wouldn't want to take it from them anyway. They spread slowly north every year, and are sometimes found in southern USA. They will occasionally cause a few deaths, but they will not wipe out cities with their swarms.
The bees that you and I encounter are all females (workers). There are also non-stinging species of bees and wasps.
Addendum:
What is honey, besides bee spit? The honey bee swallows nectar, which is mostly a sucrose + water solution. Enzymes in the bee's gut chemically transform the sucrose into a mixture of fructose and glucose. That is what honey is, mostly fructose + glucose + water. Chemists could probably do the same thing, but we don't want to eat any of their spit (That was a joke, OK?).