KSLA News 12 Shreveport, Louisiana |Dr. Pepper Loving Bees Swarm Supermarket Parking Lot

Dr. Pepper Loving Bees Swarm Supermarket Parking Lot

Hundreds of bees with an apparent craving for Dr. Pepper, swarmed a shopping cart outside a Shreveport supermarket Tuesday afternoon.  The manager of the Kroger on Pines Road says a customer left a busted can of Dr. Pepper in a shopping cart.   It wasn't long before hundreds of honey bees moved in, forming a huge circle around the queen bee, and seeming to dare anyone to get close to their drink.  

One of the two beekeepers called in to tell the bees to "buzz off", says it is not unusual to see sights like these around this time of the year.   "This is swarming season and when the queen moves, they move with the queen," said beekeeper Gail Boynton.   Boynton says the bees were attracted to the sugar in the soda.   "Any kind of sugar substance, you know, they'll find that pretty quickly."

Customers and store employees stood in the parking lot and watched as the beekeepers went to work.   Some were just as curious about the beekeepers, dressed in white suits, as they were about the bees.   "It looks like a spacesuit, is someone going up," joked customer Zetta Holden.

The beekeepers, a husband and wife team who live near Blanchard, Louisiana, brought the bees to their home where they planned to put them to work.   The couple sells honey from their home.