So you have a home range

[ENCORE50A]

Just an FYI...………………. Before setting down to send a few, check under that bench and chair.

Yellow Jackets and Bald face hornets may have built a nest there.

Second time I've went out to cut grass around the bench, looked under it only to find a yellow jacket's nest. Fixed that!

 

[Matthew323]

Just an FYI...………………. Before setting down to send a few, check under that bench and chair.

Yellow Jackets and Bald face hornets may have built a nest there.

Second time I've went out to cut grass around the bench, looked under it only to find a yellow jacket's nest. Fixed that!

Once they start building a nest in a place that they like, they return, year after year to the same spot.

My mother had an aluminum awning over her front porch that had rectangular box channels in it that yellow jackets, and those dark brown wasps would build nests in every year for decades.

Usually we would just leave them alone until cold weather set in, and then get rid of the nests.

If they proved to be aggressive and prone to stinging without provocation in any given year, then out came the wasp spray to shoot down inside the channel where the nests were to saturate the nest, and eradicate them.

Some years they built inside the channel, and other years outside the channel where you could see the nest.
Most years the nests were the size of a golf ball, maybe a little larger.

That is still enough yellow jackets, or wasps to be annoying when they get angry.

 

[ENCORE50A]

Found this on the bottom of the old bench. Killed them all.
Another bunch started on my new bench. Killed them all.

 

[Matthew323]

Found this on the bottom of the old bench. Killed them all.
Another bunch started on my new bench. Killed them all.

View attachment 9337

That's way too many to be taking chances with. Good job!!

 

[MrTom]

Twice in the last three years I have stepped in a ground wasp nest while mowing. The first time was about 15 stings on a leg. The second time it was around 30 stings on a leg. Both times I whipped up some agricultural diazanone and gave them a drink. Sure puts them down in a hurry. I used my hat once to swoosh a bee away from me then put the hat back on only to find that said bee was inside it. That wasn't much fun at all.

 

[Matthew323]

Twice in the last three years I have stepped in a ground wasp nest while mowing. The first time was about 15 stings on a leg. The second time it was around 30 stings on a leg. Both times I whipped up some agricultural diazanone and gave them a drink. Sure puts them down in a hurry. I used my hat once to swoosh a bee away from me then put the hat back on only to find that said bee was inside it. That wasn't much fun at all.

OUUUUUUUCCCCCCH!!!!

 

[03mossy]

I hate those damn things! When I see a nest the war is on as soon as the sun goes down. When we first got our hunting lease in ‘06 I was using a walk behind brush hog and tore into a ground hive. Got swarmed by a pissed off bunch of wasps. Got to the wheeler and made it back to camp where I spent the next hour laying on a picnic table while my wife pulled stingers out of my face, neck, ears, back and arms. Sucked!! But the silver lining is since that day my skin reacts to nothing. Mosquitos, poison ivy, burning nettle, etc none of it effects me. The kids say my blood has super powers from the wasp incident lol.

 

[deermanok]

Wasps and Hornets are a pain in the a$$ and they are everywhere it seems but bumblebees and wild honeybees seem to have disappeared from the landscape. Sad to say

 

[rangerod]

Wasps and Hornets are a pain in the a$$ and they are everywhere it seems but bumblebees and wild honeybees seem to have disappeared from the landscape. Sad to say

Honey Bees have whats called colony colapse disorder. This happens for a number of reasons including insecticides and lack of available food. In Iowa its fence line to fence line ag crops. Also certain pests like Varoa Mites. I quit bee keeping because I couldn't keep them alive over the winter. It just became too expensive to buy new bees every spring.

 

[Matthew323]

Honey Bees have whats called colony colapse disorder. This happens for a number of reasons including insecticides and lack of available food. In Iowa its fence line to fence line ag crops. Also certain pests like Varoa Mites. I quit bee keeping because I couldn't keep them alive over the winter. It just became too expensive to buy new bees every spring.

I remember growing up most farms had their major fields separated by fence rows. It was just accepted practice. Then the various agencies started telling the farmers that they needed to get rid of the fence rows in order to be competitive financially.

Around the same time the farmer was also being told to get rid of the manure, and instead just use the chemical fertilizers.

The only problem was that the ecosystem that those fence rows maintained, and the soil ecosystems that the manure helped maintain; meant for healthier soil, as well as fewer pests because of all the life that was contained in those fence rows.

Healthier soil meant plants less susceptible to pests, and the fence rows had all kinds of insects and birds that ate the insect pests that attacked the crop plants.

Now the soil life is gone, and crops are sometimes planted right up to the asphalt paving on the rural roads.

The chemicals rule.

And, you cannot hear a bee, or a song bird around a crop field any more.

 

[rangerod]

I remember growing up most farms had their major fields separated by fence rows. It was just accepted practice. Then the various agencies started telling the farmers that they needed to get rid of the fence rows in order to be competitive financially.

Around the same time the farmer was also being told to get rid of the manure, and instead just use the chemical fertilizers.

The only problem was that the ecosystem that those fence rows maintained, and the soil ecosystems that the manure helped maintain; meant for healthier soil, as well as fewer pests because of all the life that was contained in those fence rows.

Healthier soil meant plants less susceptible to pests, and the fence rows had all kinds of insects and birds that ate the insect pests that attacked the crop plants.

Now the soil life is gone, and crops are sometimes planted right up to the asphalt paving on the rural roads.

The chemicals rule.

And, you cannot hear a bee, or a song bird around a crop field any more.

I couldn't agree more.

 

[mrhunterken]

I don't understand how they know to keep coming back to the same area year after year, even if you kill the entire give.

 

[mrhunterken]

I don't understand how they know to keep coming back to the same area year after year, even if you kill the entire give.

That's supposed to be hive. Sorry

 

[rangerod]

I don't understand how they know to keep coming back to the same area year after year, even if you kill the entire give.

I'm not sure I understand your comment. Honey bees are home bodies that can travel as far as five or six miles to find the things they need such as nectar and pollen. They don't migrate. Their homing abilities are nothing short of amazing. Sometimes they get into certain chemicals that interfere with this homing ability and the hive can collapse when the forage bees can't find their way back. SAD

 

[Idaholewis]

Found this on the bottom of the old bench. Killed them all.
Another bunch started on my new bench. Killed them all.

View attachment 9337

That’s handy right there! Bees Nest makes some darn good over powder Wad material, Highly sought after stuff by a Lot of the BP Shotgun Guys. A forum member here from NJ Sent me a Large Nest Flattened out in a Ziplock Bag to Shoot with my Bullets

 

[fourbore]

My first visit to Texas, I pulled over to answer natures call. I stood right on a red ant hill! OMG! I was ripping my clothes off and ended up cover with bites from legs to face. It was like being in a horror movie. I had rubbed down my pant leg and the result was a wide track of bites. Some time later while driving I got one final sting near my eye ball. Yellow jackets can come out in force but nothing like a newbie standing on an ant hill.

 

[deermanok]

My first visit to Texas, I pulled over to answer natures call. I stood right on a red ant hill! OMG! I was ripping my clothes off and ended up cover with bites from legs to face. It was like being in a horror movie. I had rubbed down my pant leg and the result was a wide track of bites. Some time later while driving I got one final sting near my eye ball. Yellow jackets can come out in force but nothing like a newbie standing on an ant hill.

Those ants are definitely not fun to run into

 

[Nazgul]

Beautiful day riding my Indian Motorcycle when a wasp hit me on my neck and went down my shirt. Before I got stopped, got hit 8 times. Couple cars saw an old fat guy without a shirt on dancing on the roadside....

Forunately I have never had much reaction to any insect bite. Even jellyfish don't do much other than burn a little.

Don

 

[SuperKirby]

This isn't the first warning I've heard of said under a shooting table so now every time i mow I stop and look under. So far so good.

Now ground hornets on the other hand, those are by far the worst. Didn't know that was even a thing until after the fact. After getting my first ever food plot planted the wife and kids wanted to see it. We walked out there and one of the kids found it first. Stepped in it and they took off screaming. Initially I thought they were playing around until wife and I took another step and both felt their wrath and quickly followed the aforementioned screaming/running protocol. Between four of us we counted over 40 stings. Miraculously my wife was carrying out youngest, about two months old and he didn't get stung at all. Found a couple in the blanket he was wrapped in but none got to him.
Hate those things.