Every corner of Miami-Dade
Bees and hives in every part of Miami-Dade
Miami-Dade runs from barrier-island condos to mango groves at the edge of the Everglades. The honey bees are the same everywhere; the buildings, gates and paperwork they hide behind are not.
Miami-Dade is a big county with a crowded edge. About 2,431 square miles sit inside the county line, more than a fifth of it water, and roughly a third of the whole county lies within Everglades National Park. Homes and farms fill the strip between that park and Biscayne Bay, where 34 cities, towns and villages share the map with an unincorporated area so large that, by the county's own description, it would be the biggest city in Florida if it ever incorporated. Voters renamed the place from Dade County to Miami-Dade County in a November 1997 referendum, but the layout never changed: ocean and bay to the east, wetland to the west, farms to the south.
That patchwork matters more than people expect once bees show up. A colony in a Coral Gables coral rock wall, a swarm on a balcony rail in Sunny Isles Beach and a hive in a Redland equipment shed are the same insect. Each one, though, sits behind a different kind of building, a different gate or board, and a different set of people who have to say yes before anyone climbs a ladder. Find your part of the county below to see what removal looks like where you live.
Miami, the Grove and the Gables
The oldest parts of the county are here. Miami was incorporated in 1896 and now packs more than 300 high-rises downtown, so towers and older houses can share a few blocks. Coconut Grove, settled in 1825 and a neighborhood of the City of Miami since its 1925 annexation, keeps a heavy tree canopy over narrow, winding roads. Coral Gables was planned by George Merrick during the 1920s land boom, with a Mediterranean Revival style written into the original plan; tile roofs and ornate trim leave gaps a swarm can use. South Miami and unincorporated Westchester round out the region.
Also covered here: West Miami, Coral Terrace, Glenvar Heights, Brownsville, Gladeview.
The beaches and the islands
Out on the islands, a bee problem is often a building-management problem. Miami Beach spreads over a chain of barrier islands, some of them man-made, that separates the bay from the ocean, and its Art Deco district went on the National Register in 1979, so stucco parapets and facades get careful hands. Key Biscayne became a village in 1991 and is reached by the Rickenbacker Causeway. Fisher Island is unincorporated, while Bal Harbour, Surfside and Bay Harbor Islands govern themselves, and their condo boards and front desks tend to want insurance papers before work starts.
Also covered here: North Bay Village, Indian Creek.
North Dade
North Dade mixes rows of towers with quieter single-family streets. Sunny Isles Beach, incorporated in 1997, traded its old motel strip for high-rise condominiums, so a colony may be many floors up behind a planter or in a mechanical space. Miami Shores is a village and Golden Beach a town. Aventura, North Miami and North Miami Beach fill in between, and Miami Gardens, incorporated in 2003 and home to Hard Rock Stadium, sits inland.
Also covered here: Biscayne Park, El Portal, Opa-locka, Golden Glades, Ojus, Ives Estates, Westview, West Little River, Pinewood.
Bees anywhere inside the county line?
Call or text us a photo, day or night. A person answers, and anyone being stung is handled first.
Hialeah, Doral and the west side
Past the airport, the county turns industrial and then suburban. Hialeah, incorporated in 1925, counted 223,109 residents in 2020, the sixth-largest city in Florida. Doral became a city in 2003 and grew by about two-thirds between 2010 and 2020. Its closeness to the airport draws importers and exporters, and the warehouses that trade fills hold pallets, stacked equipment and roll-up door housings where a swarm can settle. Miami Springs, Hialeah Gardens and the town of Miami Lakes are separate municipalities, and West Kendall is an informal name for suburbs on the western edge.
Also covered here: Medley, Virginia Gardens, Sweetwater, Fontainebleau, Tamiami, University Park, Olympia Heights, Westwood Lakes, Kendale Lakes, The Hammocks, Kendall West, The Crossings, Country Walk, Three Lakes, Country Club.
Kendall and South Dade
Below Dadeland, lots stretch out and the land turns green. Kendall is unincorporated, a census-designated place of about 80,000 people. The villages of Pinecrest and Palmetto Bay and the town of Cutler Bay run their own affairs. Homestead, incorporated in 1913 and the county's second-oldest city, lies between Biscayne and Everglades national parks, with Florida City just beyond. Redland is unincorporated farm country, where stacked pots, crates and idle equipment give a swarm plenty of options.
Also covered here: Richmond Heights, Palmetto Estates, South Miami Heights, Goulds, Princeton, Naranja, Leisure City, Sunset.
Not listed? You are still inside the service area
Plenty of Miami-Dade has no page of its own here, which is a matter of space, not coverage. Several of these places are small municipalities with real character. Opa-locka, developed by aviation pioneer Glenn Curtiss and chartered as a town in 1926, holds one of the largest collections of Moorish Revival buildings in the Western Hemisphere. Indian Creek is a village of 41 home sites behind a guarded bridge. North Bay Village spreads across three islands on the 79th Street Causeway, Biscayne Park holds its meetings in a log cabin village hall, El Portal has been a state bird sanctuary since the 1950s, Medley's tax base is industrial, and Virginia Gardens borders Miami International Airport. Most other names below, from Tamiami and The Hammocks to Goulds and Leisure City, are not among the 34 municipalities, so the county itself is their local government. Each one gets the same live removal and the same 24-hour response guarantee.
- Biscayne Park
- Brownsville
- Coral Terrace
- Country Club
- Country Walk
- El Portal
- Fontainebleau
- Gladeview
- Glenvar Heights
- Golden Glades
- Goulds
- Indian Creek
- Ives Estates
- Kendale Lakes
- Kendall West
- Leisure City
- Medley
- Naranja
- North Bay Village
- Ojus
- Olympia Heights
- Opa-locka
- Palmetto Estates
- Pinewood
- Princeton
- Richmond Heights
- South Miami Heights
- Sunset
- Sweetwater
- Tamiami
- The Crossings
- The Hammocks
- Three Lakes
- University Park
- Virginia Gardens
- West Little River
- West Miami
- Westview
- Westwood Lakes
City, town, village or unincorporated
Plenty of people with Miami on the envelope live under some other government than the City of Miami. Large parts of the county, Kendall and Westchester among them, sit outside every municipality, and more than a million people live in that unincorporated area, where the county acts as the local government. The 34 municipalities, from tiny Indian Creek with its 84 residents to Hialeah, run their own.
For a bee job, that split shows up in two places. The first is access: guard houses, island bridges, condo front desks and HOA management offices each set their own rules about who comes in and when. The second is repair. When removal means cutting into stucco or lifting roof tile, the patch has to satisfy whichever local government covers your address. The roofers, painters and licensed contractors doing that patch are our own, so there is no second trade to hunt down once the bees are gone. If a board or manager wants a COI before anyone sets up a ladder, it can go out ahead of the visit. The page on HOA and property manager work covers the paperwork in more detail.
Coral rock, stucco, tile and glass
The county's buildings are as mixed as its map, and bees use whatever each one offers. Coral Gables takes its name from George Merrick's family home, built of Miami Limestone, a porous rock nicknamed coral rock, under coral-colored tile, and the city's Mediterranean Revival roofs and trim leave hollows that make tidy nest sites. On Miami Beach, Art Deco stucco and decorative parapets hide empty spaces. In the towers of Sunny Isles Beach and downtown, a colony can end up in a planter, a louver or a ceiling void many floors up, which turns removal into a job planned with building staff.
A small cavity is enough. A UF/IFAS fact sheet on African honey bees records nests in water meter boxes, cement blocks, house eaves and even barbecue grills, since they accept a much smaller space than European colonies. That is why meter and valve boxes, block and frame walls, tile and flat roofs and soffits and eaves each get their own method, and why the thermal camera comes out before any pry bar does. How a warm comb shows up through stucco or tile is laid out in the thermal imaging guide.
Groves, nurseries and the Everglades edge
South and west, the county stops looking like a city. The Redland farm belt northwest of Homestead grows mangoes, avocados, guavas and passion fruit, along with orchids and ornamental plants, and takes its name from pockets of red clay lying over oolitic limestone. Beyond the fields, roughly a third of the county is national park.
On farm and nursery land, a colony can just as easily be in a hollow trunk, an irrigation box, a stack of empty pots or a shed that stays shut for weeks as in a house. Removal there has to work around crews, crops and picking schedules, and it usually means walking the property instead of pulling into a driveway. See nursery, grove and farm removals, colonies in palms and trees and sheds and outbuildings for the specifics. Homestead was devastated by Category 5 Hurricane Andrew in August 1992, and any big storm can split trunks and lift roof edges; the storm guide covers what to look over once the wind drops.
The part that stays the same everywhere
From a Golden Beach estate to a Florida City rental, the work follows one plan. The colony is located, with thermal imaging when it is hidden, then opened up and taken out alive, comb and all, for a beekeeper to rehome. Nothing is sprayed to kill it, and relocation to beekeepers explains that hand-off. Honey and wax come out of the cavity too, because leftovers draw ants and fresh scouts, and then the opening is sealed. That seal sits under a workmanship warranty, so if bees ever move back into it, the warranty brings us back to the same spot. The reasons bees target the same spot are in why bees come back.
Price follows the job, not the zip code. When the comb hangs within arm's length of the ground, figure on $300 to $400. Opening a roof, cutting and rebuilding a wall, or staging a high-rise crew pushes the total into the thousands. After dark, and on Saturdays or Sundays, the rate is higher than on a weekday. Photos and an itemized invoice are available on request, which helps owners away for the season and anyone sorting out who pays between tenant and landlord. More on how removal is priced.
Questions people ask us
My neighborhood has no page here. Do you still come out?
Yes. Every city, town and village in Miami-Dade, and every unincorporated neighborhood between them, is inside the service area, all the way to the county line. A missing page only means there are more places than pages. Give us the nearest cross street when you reach out; our 24-hour response guarantee does not shrink for an address that is hard to find.
My address is unincorporated Miami-Dade, not a city. Does that change anything?
Not for the removal itself. It changes who sits around the job: outside the 34 municipalities, the county is your local government, while a municipal address answers to its city, town or village. When a wall or roof needs repair afterward, our own licensed contractors handle it and work with whichever office covers your property.
Are the bees in Miami-Dade Africanized, and can anyone tell by looking?
Not by eye. University of Florida entomologists note that African honey bees are hard to tell apart from European ones, though slightly smaller. The difference is behavior: African colonies defend their nest harder and may swarm more than ten times a year, against one to three for European colonies. Treat every colony as if it could be defensive and keep a wide berth.
Can you get onto a guarded island or into a gated community?
Yes, with a little help from you. Places like Indian Creek control entry at a guarded bridge, and many HOA neighborhoods use a gate or a front desk. When you call, tell us what the guard or manager needs, such as a name on a list, a vehicle description or a COI, and the visit is set up around it.
The building manager needs a COI with the association named. Is that possible?
It is. The company carries insurance and holds the proper license, and a COI listing your association, condo or management firm goes out before anyone arrives. Board approvals and building rules on elevators, roof access and work hours get folded into the schedule. Tower jobs in places like Aventura, Bal Harbour and Brickell have their own write-up under condo and high-rise removal.
What decides the final price of a removal?
Reach and repair. If the comb can be cut out by someone standing on the lawn, with nothing to tear open, expect roughly $300 to $400. A hive behind a ceiling, under roof tile or high on a building, where something must be opened and rebuilt, can run into the thousands. Evening and weekend visits carry a higher rate. The quote is free, so a photo is a good place to start.
Should we wait and see about a handful of bees circling one eave gap?
A handful of bees checking one opening, coming and going without much purpose, can be scouts from a swarm choosing a home. If the traffic grows into a steady stream with bees carrying pollen, a colony has probably moved in, and sealing the hole now would trap it inside. The scout bee guide walks through the difference, and a photo sent early saves guesswork.
Bay, suburbs or groves: start with a photo
A cross street and a line about what the bees are doing is all the quote form needs. It costs nothing, and the phones stay on overnight.
Tell us where the bees are
Three fields are enough to start: your name, a number we can reach, and the city or neighborhood. Anything else you add saves a question on the callback.
- (786) 442-2496
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- Someone picks up day and night