Flickr | Martin LaBar
LINCOLNSHIRE, Ill. (AP) — Police say someone used pesticide to kill thousands of Italian honeybees at a suburban Chicago golf resort.
Lincolnshire Marriott Resort head chef Pierre Daval found bees wiped out in five of the apiary's 20 hives earlier this month. He told WMAQ-TV he went out recently and found another eight hives were dead.
The bees are kept in a remote area on the resort, and officials say three cans of wasp and hornet spray were found nearby.
Lincolnshire Police Chief Peter Kinsey said the cans were thrown away by employees by the time it was reported to police. Police don't have any evidence.
Honey from the bees has been used in resort restaurants and in beer made for the resort. Resort general manager Kristin Duncan said the bees were last seen alive in a honey harvest in July, and that officials have no idea who killed the bees or why they did it.
Lincolnshire Mayor Liz Brandt called the act "sick and demented." She compared it to someone killing dogs or cats at a shelter, the (Arlington Heights) Daily Herald reports.
"Someone planned this and did it. There was thought," Brandt said. "What compels someone to do something like that?"
Bees become dormant in fall and winter, Duncan said, and some would have died naturally. She said security patrols will be stepped up, and that the resort will repopulate the hives in the spring as usual.
"We just may have to replenish more than we usually do because of this damage," she said.