Last year I made significant inroads to the local Wasp population by zapping those I found on our Cotoneaster blossom.
This year there are visiting mini bumble bees but no Wasps! Anyone seen any or is it too cold/early?
Mary Fisher will be after you.
Two or three have emerged from somewhere in other in my house this year
- but they have been pretty dozey, and stayed still while I zapped them!
What is the british obssesion with zapping wasps? If you ignore them they ignore you. There are a few exceptions and certain dangerous bees but in the main harmless. The nicest ones we have in Australia are mud wasps, big gangley things, they carry their balls of mud and if you are near they hover about 6" from your face and check you out then go on with their business.
The problem is they crawl all over the food you are just about to put in your mouth. And if you eat a wasp you will know about it.
The solution is wasp traps - a jam jar with a bit of jam and maybe water in the bottom, and a wasp sized hole punched in the lid. For some reason they can follow the smell of the fruit into the jar, but not the smell of the fresh air out..
That keeps em out of the sugar bowl and the cream scones
Not exactly an obsession but if left to themselves they insist on building a nest in our attic. Still not much of a problem to us but puts the fear of death into window cleaners up ladders!
I once managed to *drink* one from a soft drink tin! Luckily not stung. Perhaps it had drowned.
>In message , Arfa Daily writes
I found lots hibernating under the sheet overlaps when I replaced a big
6 asbestos barn roof a few years back.
a couple of years ago at our village fete, I took a mouthfull of beer from the glass I was carrying and noticed a 'tingling' in my mouth. I'd managed to take in a wasp which had gone for a swim. Luckily, I'd taken an anti- histamine tablet earlier. I took a few days for the effects of the sting to wear off.
Reminds me of ...
Once upon a time... I was diving at that quarry near Leicester, and after the days dives was relaxing in the on-site pub with friends on the warm summers afternoon - it was a bit waspy - then one went in an empty beer glass... Someone finished their pint and stacked it on-top... Another wasp went in - another glass was stacked. This went on for 6 or 7 glasses, each one trapping 1 or 2 wasps...
The poor barmaid who came to remove the glsses was speechless.. Probably just as well... I'm amazed we didn't get banned...
I normally leave wasps alone, but I'd been stung by one that morning when kitting up, so felt OK about their entrapment and subsequent drowning in the dishwasher.
Gordon
I don't mind the odd wasp, but I don't want any nests in or around my house because you then get hundreds of the bloody things. Zapping a queen means one less nest!
You should leave wasps alone. They are beneficial to agriculture/gardens and harmless.
A sting as a child confers a degree of immunity later. Don't be such a wimp.
Wasp do not hibernate en mass. Only the queens survive the Winter. Only honeybees survive as a colony. So you don't know a wasp from a honeybee.
and they only become a nuisance in the autumn. In spring and summer adult wasps collect caterpillars and insects to feed the young grubs. In return, the grubs exude a sweet liquid that the adult worker wasps feed on. In the autumn, the queen wasp stops laying eggs, so no more grubs to be fed or to supply the sweet liquid to the adults, so they seek it elsewhere, like from jam sandwiches, beer, rotting apples etc. It is only then that they can be a nuisance
I was standing by a mate's barbie, when a humungous wasp flew past my nose, wobbled on its flighpath and made a beeline (hah) for the glowing embers of the bbq. A sad little pop and it was no more.
Gosh, a factually correct post from harry. I'll alert the media.
Though it should have read "en masse".
Oh yes I do!
By lots I mean 20 or so across a roof of 100' x 35'.
Make a nice South facing solar site if I could stand the opprobrium.
Is that Mary?
You don't know much about orchards do you?
The only benefit I have noticed from Wasps is them catching and carrying off flies to feed their grubs.
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