What started as a routine inspection quickly turned into a bee nightmare straight out of a horror film à la Candyman. On July 21, tenant Apollo Starr (@apollostarr22) posted a video that now sits at over 1.1 million views, recounting how a routine inspection spiraled into a swarm of problems.
As the video starts, Apollo invites the audience to play a classic TikTok game: “Put a Finger Down.”
“Put a finger down if a week ago, you left for a trip to Ireland, and halfway through [your trip], your landlord [texts] you and asks you if the bee people can come into your apartment [to] do a heat scan to see if there’s any nest in the walls, and so you say ‘Yeah, sure. Just let my partner know that you’re coming in and we’ll accommodate him.’”
“Instead of like doing anything to try to fix it, he just smashes a hole in your wall and lets all the bees loose in your second bedroom so you have to remove all of your belongings and your cat from your apartment. […] Now you just have a room full of dead bees[…]. Some of them are still alive and some of them are trying to still get out, and you have to just have a room full of bees and your landlord hasn’t followed up or responded to any of your messages or calls about the said ‘Bee room,’” she said, proceeding to put her finger down.
In the next clip, Apollo opens the door to the “Bee room,” revealing a startling scene. It’s a carpet strewn with countless dead bees and three large clusters of live bees gathered on the window sill.
The comment section was swarming with reactions
People rushed to the comment section to express their genuine concern for Apollo’s predicament.
“Girl lawyer up and get that bag… absolutely not ok,” one commenter wrote.
“call your local building code people immediately,” another person wrote.
“Wish I was there to help you and the beeeees!,” wrote Erika Thompson (@texasbeeworks), better known as the Bee Lady. She’s a well-known beekeeper who creates content on safe bee removal and bee conservation throughout the state of Texas.
Others found humor in a situation that few could ever imagine happening.
“Why……did they make the hole…….on the inside?” someone asked.
“[That’s] where you put guests when they’ve been naughty,” one joked.
“Airb bee and bee,” another said.
Why were there so many bees in her apartment?
Like moths to a flame, bees seek out hives. So with one in her place, the apartment became a hot spot. And what’s worse, dead bees attract “roaches, ants and carpet beetles.”
These massive bee infestations are surprisingly common in American apartments.
Reddit threads are full of legal advice for how to get your landlord to do something about one.
A follow-up video provides new bee details
After her original video went viral, Apollo posted a follow-up video with more details in response to a commenter’s request for an update.
After expressing her gratitude for the audience’s care and concern for her, her boyfriend, and her cat, Apollo clarified a few things from her original video.
“To my knowledge, the person that came into our apartment was an actual beekeeper. Like, we have his card,” she explained.
Apollo explains that initially when the beekeeper attempted the extraction, only a small percentage of bees were present in the room. It wasn’t until later that the full extent of the infestation became apparent as the room gradually filled with honey bees.
“I did misspeak. There [weren’t] 80,000 colonies. There [were] around 80,000 bees,” she said.
But when discussing the infestation with her landlord, Apollo noted that the landlord showed little empathy, offering only minimal condolence for the inconvenience.
“My landlord replied to us after us having to reach out to her, and told us she would only be taking a couple hundred dollars off for rent and um gave us a lot of, […] I guess I should say, attitude on just like the timeline.”
@apollostarr22 can anyone help please #beeroom #landlordspecial #help #fyp ♬ original sound – 🗝️apollo starr 🌙
As the video comes to an end, Apollo explains that she doesn’t have the time nor the resources to hire a lawyer, so she won’t be pursuing that route. Instead, she prefers to focus on resolving the issue rather than seeking to financially gain from it.
Apollo Starr did not respond immediately to the Daily Dot’s request for comment via TiKTok Direct Message.
Internet culture is chaotic—but we’ll break it down for you in one daily email. Sign up for the Daily Dot’s web_crawlr newsletter here. You’ll get the best (and worst) of the internet straight into your inbox.
