Bee 'rescuer' in Peruvian capital plies his trade with passion, free of charge

LIMA, Peru (AP) — Alfredo Santiago has a unique job in Peru 's capital city of Lima: he's a bee rescuer.

The 35-year-old began as a beekeeper but added rescuing the stinging insects to his services. He often checks his cellphone for messages from people seeking help removing hives from house windows, playgrounds or even graveyards.

“I do it out of passion, to defend these animals that are so important to nature,” he said.

Once he has gotten enough requests, Santiago dons his white, one-piece beekeeper suit, takes a smoker and a wooden box and hits the streets of Lima, a city of 10 million.

Sometimes Santiago arrives at a location and people have already killed the bees. But when he’s able to rescue them, he takes them back to his home on the outskirts of Lima, where he lives as a beekeeper and sells honey.

He is apparently the only person in the city doing the job for free. “It is volunteer work. Some plant trees, others collect abandoned dogs or cats,” said Santiago, whose parents are also beekeepers.

“I am the driver, the one who carries the box, the operator, the one who (secures himself with) harnesses, the one who takes the photo and uploads it to the networks,” he said as he checks out the dark green car that he drives around the city.

Recently, Santiago had to motor more than 80 kilometers (50 miles) from one side of Lima to the other to find a hive in a house's garden. He also went to a graveyard after a man who had gone to bury his mother was stung by some bees, and they discovered that the insects had found a place on a wooden coffin.

Santiago says he gets around 100 requests a year to come and remove bee hives, and he estimates that he has rescued around 4 million bees since he started his unpaid job in 2020. People had begun to learn about him on social media.

Life for bees in Lima is not easy because the heavily populated city doesn't have lots of parks or green spaces.

On the large patio of his house, Santiago has more than two dozen green wooden boxes in which more than 400,000 bees live and “recover” after being rescued. There is honey over two plates, while some drops of water come out of a tap that fall on a piece of wood. All for the bees. After a few months, sometimes six, he takes them to the Andean forests of Peru, more than 225 kilometers (140 miles) from Lima, where his parents live and also take care of bees.

It's a family affair: Santiago said he's already thinking of buying a small beekeeper's suit for his 3-year-old daughter.

Beekeeper and rescuer Alfredo Santiago removes a colony of bees from a house garden, in Lima, Peru, Wednesday, Nov. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Guadalupe Pardo)

Beekeeper Alfredo Santiago, who also rescues bees, uses a bee smoker before opening a beehive, on the patio of his home, on the outskirts of Lima, Peru, Friday, Nov. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Guadalupe Pardo)

Beekeeper and rescuer Alfredo Santiago carries a box containing a beehive recovered from a house garden, in Lima, Peru, Wednesday, Nov. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Guadalupe Pardo)

Beekeeper and rescuer Alfredo Santiago removes a colony of bees from a house garden, in Lima, Peru, Wednesday, Nov. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Guadalupe Pardo)

Bee rescuer Alfredo Santiago removes a colony of bees from a house garden, in Lima, Peru, Wednesday, Nov. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Guadalupe Pardo)

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Writer-director Jeff Baena, whose darkly comedic independent films included “The Little Hours” and who was married to his frequent creative collaborator Aubrey Plaza, has died. He was 47.

Baena was found dead Friday morning at a Los Angeles home, according to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner's Office. His death was ruled a suicide.

Baena co-wrote David O. Russell's 2004 film “I Heart Huckabees” and wrote and directed five of his own films, four of which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival.

He had been dating Plaza for three years before she starred in his 2014 directorial debut, the zombie comedy “Life After Beth." His next film, 2016's “Joshy,” featured Thomas Middleditch as a man who gets together with friends months after his fiancee commits suicide.

The son of an attorney and teacher, Baena grew up in Miami and attended film school at New York University. He told podcaster Marc Maron in a 2017 interview that his interest in cinema was sparked after watching Stanley Kubrick's “A Clockwork Orange” and Federico Fellini's “8 1/2” as a child.

“I was always drawn to left-of-center things,” he told Jim Alexander two years ago in an interview for the Reel Talker YouTube channel.

Baena said in the same interview that it was “amazing” to work with Plaza, who appeared in four of his five films. The 40-year-old actor and producer rose to fame playing April Ludgate on the television series “Parks and Recreation” and was nominated for an Emmy for her role on “The White Lotus.” The couple married in 2021.

“The opportunities to create together, to do something creative where we're both fulfilled, it's like, how rare is that? She's down and she's so talented, so I'm really lucky," Baena said.

FILE - Aubrey Plaza, right, and Jeff Baena arrive at the premiere of "The Little Hours" at the 2017 Los Angeles Film Festival in Culver City, Calif., on Monday, June 19, 2017. (Photo by Willy Sanjuan/Invision/AP, File)

FILE - Jeff Baena arrives at the premiere of "Spin Me Round," Wednesday, Aug. 17, 2022, at The London in West Hollywood, Calif. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)