When Bret Davis was a small child, he was swarmed by yellowjackets while playing in a favorite outdoor spot. He spent the next few decades of his life being terrified of anything that buzzed or flew or crawled on him; he swatted and slapped and spoke choice words when anything so much as hinted at approaching him… until he decided to make a change and face his fear.

While working as a nurse, Bret discovered a baldfaced hornet nest on his property. He realized he had to address his “wicked phobia” and bought a bee suit on eBay so he could get up close and personal.

Bret ended up watching the nest from a distance with binoculars, feeding his growing fascination. Shortly after that, Bret’s father gassed a nest at his childhood home and Bret decided to remove and dissect it… while taking video. He posted the video on social media, and as requests for more footage rolled in from friends and colleagues, the Hornet King began to assume his larval form.

A colleague of Bret’s, considering him an expert, asked him to remove a nest from her property. He took video, of course, while fervently hoping the bee suit would function as expected and that his chosen capture method (a ShopVac) would work. It did, and that call led to others and to more video, and to the suggestion that he might want to create a YouTube channel.

In early 2019, one of Bret’s YouTube videos went viral. The rest, as one might say, is in the (browser) history.

The Hornet King was born.