I hate Yellow Jackets!

[aczlan]

Interesting thread, we have (had?) a nest of them in the wall of the house, they went in over the door behind the light. I pulled the light off othe other night and last night I blasted them with my homemade Sevin gun. I will take pics tonight and post them. Basically it uses air (from a air tank) to blast powdered Sevin out of a hose (which I set in the opening of the nest). Does quite well.

Aaron Z

 

[TomOfTarsus]

We have them going into the soffit and facia under the overhang of our split entry. We tried the sprays, etc, to no effect - it isn't reaching the nest. We hung one of those water traps with the lure in it, and got some of them. I tired of the shop vac myself; unless you have some way to keep it in place for hours, you're wasting your time, and I'll bet it uses a heap of electricity!

These kind seem to be less aggressive; I got stung once only because I was messing around with the entrance, trying to tape it over with duct tape.

But it seems like we'll have to get something or someone with a delivery system that actually snakes in and reaches the nest. It's either that or pull the siding off- not something I'm overly anxious to try...

 

[CrownHawg]

Yellow Jackets are bothersome, but Red Wasps are down right vicious! I have been battleing a nest on the corner of my house now for several years. Just when I think I have them subdued, I will see them entering in a crack on the eave. I have even tried to caulk them out (or in) to no avail. These things are relentless on this spot. I have been stung several times, but not too many at once. (I would think more than 3-4 would be enough to incapacitate). I'm at a loss with these things.

 

[woodchuckie]

Yellow Jackets are bothersome, but Red Wasps are down right vicious! I have been battleing a nest on the corner of my house now for several years. Just when I think I have them subdued, I will see them entering in a crack on the eave. I have even tried to caulk them out (or in) to no avail. These things are relentless on this spot. I have been stung several times, but not too many at once. (I would think more than 3-4 would be enough to incapacitate). I'm at a loss with these things.

In your situation I can usually see the nest from inside the attic at night and spray with the 20 foot stuff. I had one on the corner also and had to knock the wood off the eve(at night) to find the nest.

 

[skent]

as far as turning the shop vac off, all I did was pull the hose off while the vac was still on, and plugged the inlet hole with duct tape, THEN turned power off. Let the shop vac sit for a week and they were all dead.

My shop vac pulls around 6 amps, (660 Watts for 3 hours or 2 KWH), not much more then the pool filter, our rate for electricity is around .14 per KWH, so that comes to less than $.30 . (Cheaper than Raid)

 

[gonegreen]

All of these Bee stories have me grinning like a skunk eating Yellow Jackets. Well here's my experience 6 weeks ago. The wife (whose allergic to bees) was push mowing around the house and got nailed by two of them. After further investigation, I located the nest. It was two inches from the basement (plastic) window well. I had debated the gasoline and match idea but common sense kicked in. I settled for a couple quarts of gas and a stone to shove in the hole. I also used the "sneak up on them" approach - early on a Saturday morning. I am also allergic to bees and was very happy when I didn't have any confrontations. About two hours later I needed something out of the basement and found out something in the process. Gasoline vapors will travel into the french drains and basement drains very quickly & easily! It took two days with all of the basement windows open and two fans running to air it out. The wife was happy the bees were gone but not so impressed with the "plan".

 

[Ken45101]

You were very lucky!

Part of the reason gasoline is so dangerous is that the fumes are heavier than air and sink into low spots. Also gasoline vapor is very explosive in wide concentrations (2% to 96% IIRC). If the fumes had reached a pilot light in the basement, your house could have disappeared. The explosive force of a gallon of gasoline (fumes) is equivalent to two sticks of dynamite.

Ken

All of these Bee stories have me grinning like a skunk eating Yellow Jackets. Well here's my experience 6 weeks ago. The wife (whose allergic to bees) was push mowing around the house and got nailed by two of them. After further investigation, I located the nest. It was two inches from the basement (plastic) window well. I had debated the gasoline and match idea but common sense kicked in. I settled for a couple quarts of gas and a stone to shove in the hole. I also used the "sneak up on them" approach - early on a Saturday morning. I am also allergic to bees and was very happy when I didn't have any confrontations. About two hours later I needed something out of the basement and found out something in the process. Gasoline vapors will travel into the french drains and basement drains very quickly & easily! It took two days with all of the basement windows open and two fans running to air it out. The wife was happy the bees were gone but not so impressed with the "plan".

 

[Captinjack]

I've found that drain oil works the best in ground holes. About half a gallon milk jug or so and you will never see another bee again in that hole. Always do it at night when they are all home.

I had a 4 ft. high nest between the studs on a garage wall and I was ripping off the siding. WOW! A huge cloud of yellow jackets came out, but no one was stung. We used all the wasp spray that we had and it didn't make a dent. We had to get the job done so I filled a 2 gallon weed sprayer with kerosene and set it on fine mist spray pattern. In a couple of minutes they were all dead and back to work we went. The kero worked as good as or better than the commercial spray.

Once I had only gasoline so I mixed a 50-50 mix with drain oil and that worked great also. Straight gasoline is just toooooooooo dangerous.

 

[Butch Howe]

Yesterday my wife got stung twice with the yellow jacket ground bees. I went out last night about midnite and dug them out. Nest was about a foot in diameter and about a foot deep. These guys won't be stinging anybody anymore!! I smashed the nest with the shovel and poured gasoline and tossed a match.

 

[alvanko]

Like aczlan said. I use sevin dust. I also built a "sevin blaster". PVC pipe on the end of an old sandblaster gun. Put some sevin dust in the end (like a muzzle gun). Take it over to the roof eve where the bees are. Hook my air hoze up and "poof". The bees track it in back to the nest and in a day or two they will be dead.
Same with inground bees. Just put some sevin dust in a can, plop it into the hole in the grond, and a couple days later, no more bees.