My wife has taken supreme pleasure in dispatching these terrorists once she learned all you need is a spray bottle with a dish soap mix in it. No wasp spray needed, the soap covers their body and they suffocate. I was on patrol yesterday taking care of some real Death Star paper wasp constructions and one got a bead on me and swung in from my 9 o'clock and did a glancing sting on my thumb holding the spray bottle. He most certainly isolated on the threat and took immediate action, so I give it to the wasp for that. IMMEDIATE feel like I hammered my thumb driving in a nail. Last time I got stung by one of these.....God's creations....I was 5 or so years old, still remember it like yesterday, decades later. I put some ice on it and after calming down a bit I was fine yesterday and took some Zyrtec. Today my whole thumb is itching a bit and slightly swollen.

Kill them all. Nuke from orbit.

Now that you open the topic, I'll share my recent experience. Was out stacking wood two weeks ago and suffered a hornet sting on my wrist. I did the Nazi jig and yelped. Went into the shop and retrieved a huge propane torch wand and tank. Lit those suckers right up. Sounded like rice crispies. Anyway 13 hours later I woke up with a swollen arm and tightness in my chest. Turns out over the years I've developed an allergy to sting venom. Tried to ignore it an began having trouble breathing. So I woke Mrs DF and she stabbed me with an epi-pen she keeps in her first aid bag. I suffered for 7 days with swelling and complications.

I say all of that to tell you it might be wise to put an epi-pen in your first aid kit. You just never know.....

We get the red variety of paper wasps here and they are known as the most aggressive paper wasp species. They're as industrious as ants, and breed like cockroaches.

I only use insecticidal soap in my organic veggie and herb garden. It works but IMO it's too slow for stinging insects.

I go through 3 bottles of Spectracide Pro a year (~2 of them in my fall shrub and hedge trimming) and buy it at Home Depot. What makes it superior to other off the shelf was sprays is that it shocks them plus delivers 3 insecticides. They drop from the sky and are typically dead before hitting the ground.

Lat year the bastards built a basketball-sized nest in the hose reel attached to my outside faucet. I took great pleasure in cutting this out with my ESEE Junglas after the first few freezes, and fire pit roasting the larva that were over-wintering inside. This year, they've moved to my stepladder displacing the doves that have nested there for the past decade or so. So I get to do it again this winter!

I've managed to avoid the annual yellow jacket attack for a few years now. Paying someone to mow my lawn might have something to do with it, but it used to be a regular August treat. Wasps (and mosquitos) have to be the nastiest critters Ma Nature ever evolved.

we get the paper wasps/hornets (big paper nests in eves and trees),
the comb style , as in the nest look like a dry piece of huney comb, these can be red or orange,

also paper wasps, called bald faced , that like to nest on the ground in a paper bag etc,

and of course, yellow jackets, also called nature's assholes,


been a good while since I have beenn stung by a either, but did get lit up by some damn poisonous caterpillar a few summers ago, stung on my finger and thumb, hurt like hell


neighbor up the street was clearing some brush and got into a nest of yellow jackets, he was supposedly not allergic, yet he died from an allergic reaction in about a 1/2 hour, ,

We normally are over-run with paper wasps around these parts. Millions of them nesting everywhere. Oddly enough, I haven't seen any this year or last year. Strange.

Even with as many as we usually have, I don't mind too much. They are typically very docile and prefer to keep to themselves and just do their wasp thing...whatever that is.

A few years back, though, we had what seemed like twice as many as normal and they became very aggressive as the summer went on. Rat bastards were even nesting inside the side mirror housings of my truck and under the handles on the doors. Constantly in your face and dive bombing. No stings though, just annoying as hell and a little nerve wracking.

Our kids spazz out at the sight of them and spurn nature so I tell them leave them alone and they will leave you alone, but I don't want them taking up residence in my sheds, garage, car parts, they can find somewhere else to live their life. Our son got to witness the results of my no knock forceful eviction though, I tempered my response because of that. Part of the problem was they were inside the sheds, so I had to reach in to spray and I was in their exit path. But I was well clear of the shed when I got it. I kept forgetting to bring the spray she uses so I tried the pricey plant soap insecticide spray I had on hand a couple days ago and it didn't do much but annoy them.

I always like the YouTube "barn find revival will it run after 30 years" guys who take carb cleaner and a match to them.

Last time a red wasp got me was on my shin. But the second time a scorpion got me was the most painful thing I've ever experienced. I almost needed counseling after that one. But then after the many thousands I've killed over the years, I guess my number was up.

We have a semi-docile variety of paper wasp around here. They build very small (a bit bigger than golfball) size nests in the corners of the garage doors and make no real effort to pursue.

OTOH: The bald faced hornets are the spawn of Satan and will go out of their way to chase and sting.

Bald face hornets here. Big bastard' that over the summer can build huge nest's. DO NOT GET STUNG BY ONE!

If there's a bunch of wasps I use the long shot stuff from the can. Shoot once and run like hell. Next day shoot them again. At work the overhead is open for much of the day. Anything that gets inside I hit it with hair spray. They drop like a stone, and are dispatched safely. Newbies discover a can of hair spray on my bench and look at my shaved head with a quizzical look on their face.

years ago as a young teenager and walking outside in the yard eating a piece of bread with jelly smeared on it. small piece left and put in my mouth and start chewing.. suddenly something was tasting funny and top of mouth started hurting bad .. spit out the jelly bread and saw a yellow jacket on the bread and mouth really hurting .. Had a visiting uncle who made me take a big bite of chewing tobacco supposidly to counteract the yellow jacket sting in top of my mouth....Do not know which made me sicker and feeling worse??? The chaw of tobacco or the yellow jacket sting in the top of the mouth...I can still taste the sweet stinging feeling some 50 + years later. ............ drill sgt.

quote:

Bald fact hornets

^^^^^^
New species?? No murder hornets???

quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:
Bald fact hornets here. Big bastard' that over the summer can build huge nest's. DO NOT GET STUNG BY ONE!

They build nests incredibly fast. You can have a volley ball sized sphere of hate within weeks.

As a beekeeper, I have a couple sets of bee suits, veils and gloves.

I hate getting stung by wasps, yellow jackets, mud daubbers etc etc etc. Bees, not so much.

I took an older, not real comfortable suit, not my favorite to wear, and have dedicated it to anything other than bees, for the purpose of spraying the assholes, not my honey bees. (my newer bee suit is much more comfortable, better ventilated and airier, etc and is reserved for bee hive work only.

When I need to go on patrol around the property and kill of the undesirables I wear the dedicated suit. It's a full length suit, long sleeved of course, the veiled hat that zips in, and the pant cuffs velcro tighly around calf length boots (never wear flip flops, sandals, tennis shoes etc when doing this). I have bee gloves, which are very flexible fine leather gloves with long sleeves that come up past the elbows and have elastic bands to help seal up.

So then I'm covered head to toe, have pretty much unobstructed vision, and I can get right in there and go into killer mode and be safe.

Bee suits arn't exactly cheap, and there are other alternatives to a full-length suit. You could go to bee sites such as Dadant, Mann Lake, etc there are others, and sometimes Tractor Supply has suits. If you know a local beekeeper you could ask them for help, possibly find a good used suit. fleabay is an option too.

Sure enough, if one of the neighbors see me attired as such, I get asked if I wouldn't mind stepping over and continue my war fighting on their property. I don't mind at all.
.

quote:

Originally posted by OKCGene:
As a beekeeper, I have a couple sets of bee suits, veils and gloves.

I do this with skeeters.

Every so often we'll get a particularly wet spring and subsequent bumper crop of mosquitoes. I'm talking swarms that will prevent you from doing anything outside certain times of the day (or occasionally all day). There's not a chance during those times that I'd be able to water the garden or mow the lawn without putting on my bee suit (jacket and hood). It's a life saver. Thankfully, a couple of dry days in the 90s kills them off and things get back to normal.

As far a killing off wasps and such, I just go out at night and hose down the hives with the 30 foot spray. Used a shotgun once on a nest the size of a beachball. That was fun.

We have a constant fight with the damn things here. I hunt them at night during their active season with foaming stream wasp killer. I buy a case of the stuff every spring. We have armadillos here and a beneficial thing they do is dig up yellowjacket nests and eat the larvae.

Sounds like you need THE perfect excuse to buy a Bug Assault gun.