【eroticizing the rural bydavid bell】

Millions of honey bees in South Carolina have eroticizing the rural bydavid belldied of pesticide poisoning after local officials used aerial mosquito spraying in the fight against the spread of the Zika virus.

Dorchester County officials have acknowledged the killing of the bees in a press release and added that a notice to beekeepers was sent out more than 24 hours before spraying. “I am not pleased that so many bees were killed," County Administrator Jason Ward said.

However, local beekeepers told ABC they only had about ten hours to prepare for the spraying, which occurred on Sunday morning.

A single apiary, Flowertown Bee Farm and Supply in Summerville, lost 2.5 million bees as 46 hives died on the spot. "When I went out... it was like visiting a cemetery, pure sadness," Kristina Solara Litzenberger, a local woman, said on a Facebook post.

Company co-owner Juanita Stanley said the farm “looks like it’s been nuked".

Another local beekeeper, Andrew J Macke, called aerial spraying "carpet bombing" and said lately it had been difficult to protect the bees because of the hot weather (which hit 92°F).

"Due to this high temperature there are literally thousands upon thousands of bees hanging off the outside of the hive," he said. "Aerial spraying is just plain insane. There needs to be a registry for beekeepers and they can do mosquito abatement from the ground to stay a safe distance away from the beekeepers."

In another post, Macke said bees were his livelihood, and he'd lost tens of thousands of dollars:

Four cases of the Zika virus have been confirmed in the Summerville area of Dorchester County.

In order to fight the spread of the mosquito-borne virus, the area was sprayed with Naled, an insecticide in the organophosphate pesticide family that is commonly used to kill adult mosquitoes.

The pesticide, which has been registered since 1959 for use in the U.S., kills mosquitoes on contact and doesn't pose a risk to people, though direct exposure "should not occur", according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

This was the first time Dorchester County utilized spraying from the air.