The yellow six-legged winged typed that sting to be precise. There’s a gap between the window and the bricks on my garden shed and I can see them coming and going during the day. I cant see exactly where they are on the inside because of all the stuff stored there. My dog also sleeps in there at night time so I want these guys gone as quickly as poss. Some questions :
What is the best way of getting rid of them? I bought some wasp killing spray that contains TETRAMETHRIN 0.20% W/W. Will this do the job?
Do they build a nest? If I move some of the stuff in the shed to try and locate them do I risk pissing them off and getting savagely stung?
What is the best time to attempt spraying them? I was thinking they might be more docile at night time.
Unless they are building a nest in an area that humans cannot avoid, and thus being a danger to you, I see no reason to get rid of them. Wasps are considered beneficial bugs and eat quite a few garden pests.
In October, once there is a good frost, they will die anyway. But if you insist on killing them, you need to find the nest and spray it at night while they are at rest. It really is easier just to live and let live until the cold weather kills them for you.
Normally I would but as I said my dog sleeps in there during the night. She’s quite inquisitive and dont want her getting stung. With the weather we’ve been having here lately it could be another 2 or 3 months before we get frost.
I was at a wedding, and the people who owned the house had brown lunch bags hanging up. She said they were there because bees and wasps are territorial, and they’ll think it’s a different nest. I don’t know how true it is, I was actually going to ask here, but she swears by it.
God help me, I tried in mid-summer. I have a gap between the stairs and the siding at my front door. They built a nest there. I personally didn’t mind them because they kept away salespeople and door-to-door proselytizers, but one day one of my kids got stung, and the ex complained.
Sooooooo… I asked around, and someone suggested I buy some Mono ™, which is an expanding insulator that comes in a tube like caulking. “Just spray it in there, go inside, and in two minutes your problem is gone.” I said YUK but okay.
Well, the nozzle on the tube didn’t work very well, and the latex gloves that were supposed to come with it didn’t, so I ended up getting a lot of this expanding and almost invulnerable substance on my hands and in various places around the house. Very messy. Some got in the sink and I had to pay for a plumber.
Then I went out finally and sprayed inside the gap. There about 40 wasps living there. Exactly one of them came and stung me on the end of a finger, a sensitive place that hurt for weeks. The rest of them honed in and started digging away at the same spot. About half of them died stuck to the icky gunk. The rest stood on the corpses and succeeded in burrowing a hole through the gunk. Afterwards, they systematically disposed of all the corpses. The nest is still there.
To make a long story short, leave them alone. They are way smarter and braver than humans. Wait til frost, then destroy the nest by any means you choose.
There are some specific wast-killing sprays you can buy at hardware or farm supply stores, but you may need a little courage to actually get withing two feet of the nest and spray. The “leave them alone” strategy isn’t such a bad idea either. Yellow Jackets, though vicious stingers, are not really that aggressive, even if your dog stand right under their nest barking at them, they probably won’t even notice him.
I use the big ol’ black can of Raid for wasps, it’s some anti-wasp formula with–most importantly–outstanding range. We’re talking at least 10 feet. Gives me plenty of time to hop out on the porch, spray, slam the door, and laugh as the wasps die.
I found a yellowjacket nest just above my front door. There was a hole in the siding and they were going in and out through it. A whole can of Raid wasp killer didn’t have much effect. Finally, I put on a leather glove and tried plugging the hole with some patching plaster (well I had a can around). The little buggers bored right through that, so I plugged it with steel wool. The ones trapped inside had had it, but there what turned out to be a couple hundred outside. I really could not believe how many I ended up getting with an ordinary fly swatter. My very first swipe got 8 of them! Yes, I counted. After that, the numbers went down, but you wouldn’t believe the pile of corpses I had after two days of on and off swatting. As for live and let live, they made it very unpleasant to be on the porch, where I spend a lot of time every summer. If they left me alone, I would be more than happy to let them be. I never go after bees, for example, since if I get stung by a bee (which has happened only twice anyway), I feel it is my fault, but the yellowjackets go after me.
What is a yellow jacket? Is that the same as a wasp? Like I said, wasps (Canadian term) do not bother you unless you invade their nest. Like Iraq, for example.
Yellow jacket is a type of wasp, I’m not really certain what their range is, but I think they’re confined mainly to the southern US. So whatever you have in Canada is probably different.
I had a yellowjacket nest in the siding right next to my front door a few years ago. I went to the store and bought some wast killer spray - I don’t remeber the contents or brand, but it was the kind which sprays out a concentrated stream of liquid death about 5 feet long. I started by crouching by the nest and spraying about half a can of the stuff into the hole in the siding. Then I plugged that hole with silicone jell, and then spent an hour picking off the remaining outdoor yellowjackets one by one as they came back and tried to find the entrance to their nest. None of them lived long enough to dig a hole in the silicone. I haven’t seen a wasp there since.
Yellowjackets (known simply as ‘wasps’ here in the UK) are common right across Northern Europe, I think I’d be surprised if they weren’t also found in Canada and anywhere else with suitable climate.
I’m sure that the actual species of wasp that is called yellow-jacket varies by region. Here in Texas our version of yellow-jacket is mean spirited and aggressive. They also tend to build their nests where people can stumble upon them.
If you don’t have a hanging nest, you might want to consider a powder instead of a spray. The actual nest may be a little bit away from the crack that they are entering through, so a spray may not do the trick.
At your local hardware store they should carry an insecticide powder and usually a little bellows type rig for blowing this powder into the crack/gap. The little bastards will track this into their nest and they will be dead in a day or two.