My driveway at the house is within about six feet of the property line. I live in the country, so that portion of the yard is left alone for the most part.
It's a great "vision barrier" for the neighbor and her farm animals.
The actual property line is a stacked stone fence, and as mentioned before, the driveway to my equipment/shop building is close to the stone fence.
That narrow strip of ground is left to do what un-maintained property does.
There are several trees, oak & white birch, wild grape vines, red rose slash prickers, some overgrown lilac bushes, and sumac. It's pretty thick growth between the edge of the driveway and the stone fence.

Every few years, you have to trim overhanging tree branches, and in general, move the brush away from the blacktop driveway edge, and reclaim some real estate.
Moving trailers around, driving vehicles back to the building, and loading tractors, ATV's & side by side's onto trailers, and after several years, the vegetation starts winning.
Another problem in the winter, when clearing snow off the driveway, the snow falls off the limbs and brush, and you end up wearing it.

So yesterday was the day, I got my Fiskars hand operated pole saw, and clippers, and started trimming overhanging white birch tree limbs and branches off the big birch tree.
That birch tree is two tree trunks, each about ten to twelve inch diameter at ground level.
I chain all of my trailers up when not actively in use to help keep the local drug addicts and thieves honest. My big steel double axle trailer is chained to that twin lead white birch tree.

So I start hacking overhead limbs off the tree so they don't drag on vehicles, and to get them up off the tractor ROPS which stick up about seven feet.
As I'm using the pole saw removing branches, I am imparting some motion to the tree, and before long I start seeing GIGANTIC hornet type insects flying around the white birch tree.
Immediately, I back off and assess the situation. They look like regular hornets, but the big ones are about 1.5" long!

It appears they aren't overly aggressive, and they seem to live in patterns of holes bored directly in the birch tree trunks.
I continued with my tree trimming and brush clearing, and after several hours of manual labor, I moved all the limbs, branches, and brush away from the driveway and onto my brush pile.

After completion, I got my cell phone and tried taking some photos. The phone is a Google Pixel 9 Pro XL, and I am really impressed with the image quality from that cell phone camera.
I was about four feet away from the tree, and used 10x zoom.

Further research with Google, they appear to be European Hornets, and relatively widespread across the USA. My initial worry was that they might have been Asian "murder" Hornets,
but those have distinctive yellow "feet" at the ends of the legs. (Asian Hornets are considered an invasive species in the USA)

I stood about four feet away from the tree for about twenty minutes and took photos, and the hornets left me alone. Their eyes are big enough to see, and they DID watch me while I took the photos.
Sadly, I am going to kill them off.
They are voracious eaters of yellow jackets, wasps, bald faced hornets, but European Hornets can and do sting repeatedly.
They are the only bee/wasp/hornet type species that actually hunts during darkness.
So, be wary. The old trick about spraying nest sites during hours of darkness doesn't work with this species.

My Girlfriend is severely allergic, (Epi-pen) and they need to be gone.
If you look closely, you can see "little faces" peering out from the bored holes in the tree trunks.
To my untrained eye, the hornets on the outside seemed to be "feeding" the hornets inside the bored holes.

PXL_20250921_192537793 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

PXL_20250921_192534114 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

PXL_20250921_191919944 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

PXL_20250921_191911642 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

PXL_20250921_191905205 by cee_Kamp 32ACP, on Flickr

Big bucket of nope on this one.
I had a Cicada Killer fall out of a tree [injured?]. Big enough it made a thump when it hit the ground.

Invasive European hornets. While large and intimidating, they are slow bumbling fliers compared to Yellowjackets or bald faced hornets (which are actually members of the Yellowjacket family). Destroy with extreme prejudice. Each hive will produce between 100 and 200 queens so destroying the nest is of great benefit to our environment.

HA!
I was just sitting down in my back yard taking a break from chipping and looked over at the arm of my chair and there was your cousin staring back up at me. I got up slowly and stomped his ass into oblivion…
Didn’t see any other ones.

If it helps, I had a friend with a P-51D Mustang who I could call to see if he has any napalm he could drop there?

Hans…get the flammenwerfer.

When I saw the first Cicada killer it freaked me out. Huge! I killed one, set it next to my PC to research.
Harmless to me. I would stand next to their hole in the ground and they would buzz around my ankles but never touched me.
It was still creepy!

quote:

Originally posted by newtoSig765:
If it helps, I had a friend with a P-51D Mustang who I could call to see if he has any napalm he could drop there?

quote:

Originally posted by KMitch200:
Hans…get the flammenwerfer.

Nuke it from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

Yeah... big nope from me. I guess let us know how your eradication efforts go.

I was mildly alarmed to discover that the milkweed plant out front next to our saguaro was a favorite of some tarantula hawk wasps last fall. It's only a foot or so off our front walkway from the front door to the street, so many times last year, I was walking within arm's reach of the world's most painful wasp sting. I did a lot of reading and determined that as long as we didn't pose a threat, they'd leave us alone. That worked out. I'm kind of hopeful they don't come back this fall.

did a little research, Euro Hornets like Birch trees, the sap is used for a food source and they tear apart bits of the tree to make the nest which is usually internal in a large cavity.

The tree may have internal rot or openings making it dangerous from that stand point along since they look for hollow spaces for nesting.

While they are not aggressive when undisturbed, when the nest is attacked they can get aggressive so consider that...

From Eh Eye!

European hornets strip bark from birch trees to make nests and feed on sap, often building nests in tree cavities 6+ feet off the ground. To control them, locate and treat the nest with a labeled insecticide, as they can become aggressive if the nest is threatened. Untrained individuals should contact a professional pest control service for nest removal.

What is a European hornet nest in a birch tree?

Behavior: European hornets chew on the bark of birch trees to extract wood fibers for their nests and the sap underneath for nourishment.

Nest Location: They typically build their paper nests in cavities of trees, such as hollow trunks, which are often 6 feet or more above the ground.

Appearance: The nests are made of a fragile, brown or tan paper-like material.

In August I noticed a few wasps buzzing around the front of my house. I went out the front door one day to pick up a box the UPS guy had left there, and one of those little bastards zipped over and tagged me on my forearm. I wasn't fucking with them at all, but after that I declared war.

There's a decorative brick section on the front face of the house, a 90 degree corner, and then the siding panel about 4' wide that ends at the front door. There's a tiny gap, maybe 3/16" wide, between the last brick and the trim board that's nailed onto the edge of the siding panel. That gap was where the wasps were at. After watching it for a while I figured out they were going in behind the siding panel and probably building a nest.

I had two big tall cans of Raid wasp and hornet spray, so for a couple days I'd watch them and occasionally crack the door open and zap one of them with a shot of Raid. Got fairly good at hitting them in mid-air. I'd spray one and it would fall to the ground and struggle for a few seconds before expiring. Die you little bastard, DIE!

But there were more of them than I'd ever be able to get that way. So after giving the pest control guy a call I snuck out through the garage with both cans of Raid, stood off about 10 or 12 feet and let fly. I emptied both cans into that tiny little gap. The pest control guy showed up the next morning, but by then I wasn't seeing any more wasps. He gave the whole area a shot of some stronger repellent stuff and told me to call him again if they reappeared. So far they haven't, but I'm still not entirely sure whether they're really all dead, or just biding their time and planning a massive counterstrike. I did go out there a day later and give that section of siding a good thump or two before retreating quickly back into the house. I heard something break loose and crash to the bottom of the wall gap, I'm guessing that was the nest.

I greatly prefer red can CRC brand Brake Cleaner (chlorinated) for inside the house bee/wasp/hornet eradication, or outside on painted/vinyl/aluminum/masonry surfaces.
Every bee/wasp/hornet aerosol can I have ever used is oily, and leaves stains behind, especially on painted plaster, drywall & masonry.
Brake Cleaner evaporates in seconds without leaving any stains behind, even on flat/matte/satin painted drywall.

Outside in a tree, all bets are off! FLAME THROWER.
The new Queens will not appear from the nest until spring, and that leaves me plenty of time.
Winter will kill all of the Females, Males, and Drones (workers) except for the fresh/new batch of Queens.
I bet I can spray something directly in all of those bored holes in the tree in mid January when it's -10 Fahrenheit without much in the way of risk of being stung.
For entertainment purposes yesterday, I did hose all of the bored holes in the tree with a full can of Brake Cleaner.

During winter, I'm thinking a trigger pump style oil can, filled with gasoline. I keep several in my shop.
Stick the oil can dispensing tube inside the bored holes, and give each hole several squirts/pumps of good non ethanol 91 Octane gasoline.
How far I can stick that dispensing tube into the tree should also indicate the size/presence of a interior hollow cavity.
The gasoline fumes/vapors are toxic.
If there is several feet of snow on the ground then, I may even consider lighting a match!

i'm dealing with some type of nest in between my house siding and door awning. I can't see the nest but I see where they go in and out. I grabbed my garden sprayer and mixed up some Dawn. Kills them pretty well but it looks like I will need to buy some foaming hornet killer to get into the nest.

quote:

It appears they aren't overly aggressive ...

You must not have caught them during Angry Hour.

I'm going with the "Fire" option.
Then soak it in gas and light it up again, just to make sure.