"To the poor soul who lifted the shop vac out of the back of my truck, I wanted to give you a heads up... The vacuum was there because it was filled with European hornet queens,” owner of Philadelphia Bee Co., Don Shump, said.
A Philadelphia thief may be in for a rude awakening once they realize the shop vac they lifted from the back of a pickup truck is actually filled with hundreds of hornets.
The owner of Philadelphia Bee Co., Don Shump, posted on Facebook that he is anxiously waiting to hear how it ended for a thief who stole his hornet-filled shop vac.
"To the poor soul who lifted the shop vac out of the back of my truck, I wanted to give you a heads up... The vacuum was there because it was filled with European hornet queens,” Shump wrote.
Shump told The Philadelphia Inquirer that he thinks there were about 400 European hornets, at least half of which were queens, that he had trapped in there the day before and were probably left in a not-so-happy mood.
“Those girls should be full of life and extra spicy,” Shump wrote on Facebook.
The European hornets deliver a non-lethal but incredibly painful sting and the thought of the unsuspecting thief unsealing the vacuum hose worries the beekeeper, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.
“I see someone pulling out the hose and being stunned,” Shump told The Philadelphia Inquirer. “They would hear the buzzing and some would crawl out, and some would fly out and start bouncing off them until they got a hold … then it would dawn on them that they were actively being attacked.”
Shump told Philly Voice that while it's unfortunate to lose the $110 vacuum, it wasn’t too much of a concern to him as it should be to the thief.
"It's not going to make or break us, but it's one of those situations where it couldn't have been worth it for this person with what they ended up with," Shump told Philly Voice. "I don't need it back, but (the thief should) just put it down wherever it is and don't open it. I still have wasps from that removal that are alive, so maybe give it a week to be safe."
