How to Kill yellow jackets?

[chucko]

Found them when I was clearing with a bush ax (well they found me)

caned wasp spray seemed useless
can not use gas because that are at the base of a group of trees I do not want to kill withing feet of a lake.

I wanted till after dark and seven dusted them (because I had some)
seemed to slow them down but they were still there but not nearly as mean
Did it again last night with 1/2 bottle of malathion(sp?) mixed in 2 gallons of water and dumped that on them.


So if they are still there tonight then what?

 

[J_J]

How close are you to a 110v source? If close, a large bug zapper will sizzle every one of them in short order. I have done it for revenge after accidentally bumping their nest/ hole in the ground by pampas grass.

 

[Turbys_1700]

Probably not the most environmental friendly method but effective...
Find the entrance hole in the ground to their nest after dark...
Take a 10oz. Coke or Pepsi bottle and fill with gas...
Stick the bottle into the hole...
Leave it there until the morning...
This will kill the nest...

 

[schoolsout]

We've used Delta Dust before to get rid of some ground bees in our yard. Not sure if it killed them, but they were a no show afterwards

 

[chucko]

Finding the exact point of the hole is a problem due to the amount of ground cover that is still there and I can't use gas it will kill my plants I want to keep and might get into the lake

I do like elec near by and like the bug zapper idea. Do I need to get the good and po-ed at it so they start attacking it?

 

[Carl_NH]

Chucko,

The malathion should take care of them - I use Permethrin which is from the chrysanthenum flower family, but can be toxic in water - not that Malatihion isnt..

I do the same thing mix up 1-2 gallons in a 5 gal bucket and pour in the hole and that gets them pretty fast. I would bet you dont have many left.

Another trick I heard was to fill a 5 gallon bucket with sand and water to make a slurry and dump on top of the nest leaving the bucket over the opening..

Good luck.. they really sting fast as you know.

Carl

 

[retiredmgn]

After dark I throw some used motor oil down the hole. Slow burning, soaks into the ground, nests are on the ceiling of the hole so they don't get upset, little odor. Then a little bit of gas just to get it going so I don't have to hang around with my hand in the hole to get the oil burning. Works every time. I don't think it will harm the trees. Won't burn long enough to heat up anything but a couple hundred bees.
I have found this combination effective enough you can even stay close and listen to the gentle humming of the mass killing actually happening. Of course only if you are into such things - like listening to all the little bestids die who would just as soon sting you to death.

 

[deepNdirt]

I am very familiar of what you're having to deal with, Most all ground nesting bees I have dealt with have two ways in and out of their nest, usually found within a couple feet from each other, There is a foam spray that you can use to fill up their hole's in order to help contain and kill some of them, however this stuff dissolves after a few minutes and it doesn't kill them fast enough before they can come at you,..... so do this before the foam fully dissolves, You can put some netting over the holes and lay boards to hold down the edge of the net down, then be ready with some good hornet spray to shoot into the net as the bee's will start slowly coming out , this usually gets about 95% of them, be sure to wear eye & mouth protection to keep from breathing or getting it into your eyes,

 

[SandburRanch]

So if they are still there tonight then what?

--------------------------------------------------------------------
Where is your sporting spirit. You go into battle with a badminton racket so they have a fair chance.:laughing:

 

[J_J]

Finding the exact point of the hole is a problem due to the amount of ground cover that is still there and I can't use gas it will kill my plants I want to keep and might get into the lake

I do like elec near by and like the bug zapper idea. Do I need to get the good and po-ed at it so they start attacking it?

Plug in the bug zapper, and place on a 20 ft stick of PVC, and edge up to the hole and bump it a little. They will come out and attack the bug light until there are none left.

 

[deepNdirt]

Plug in the bug zapper, and place on a 20 ft stick of PVC, and edge up to the hole and bump it a little. They will come out and attack the bug light until there are none left.

I like this idea :thumbsup: I know where a nest is about 50 ft. behind my shop at a old tree stump, I think I'll give it a try..... does it matter if it's night or day

 

[creekbend]

I am very familiar of what you're having to deal with, Most all ground nesting bees I have dealt with have two ways in and out of their nest, usually found within a couple feet from each other, There is a foam spray that you can use to fill up their hole's in order to help contain and kill some of them, however this stuff dissolves after a few minutes and it doesn't kill them fast enough before they can come at you,..... so do this before the foam fully dissolves, You can put some netting over the holes and lay boards to hold down the edge of the net down, then be ready with some good hornet spray to shoot into the net as the bee's will start slowly coming out , this usually gets about 95% of them, be sure to wear eye & mouth protection to keep from breathing or getting it into your eyes,

You are correct about two holes-- entrance and exit holes. I used this method around 2 weeks ago. Fill two 6 ounce glass juice bottles half full of gas, put one in each hole, remove both bottles and drop a lighted match in each hole. The reason that I use small glass bottles is that when they are turned upside down, they don't have a tendency to fall over as is the case when using plastic bottles. The gas burns pretty fast, and usually gets all the critters down there. But there remains the chance that some stragglers are not in the nest, but rest assured that they won't be using the OLD nest for awhile. Happy Tractoring.

 

[creekbend]

Plug in the bug zapper, and place on a 20 ft stick of PVC, and edge up to the hole and bump it a little. They will come out and attack the bug light until there are none left.

That's an innovative approach. I have never tried that before. Smart thinking. Happy Tractoring.

 

[J_J]

I like this idea :thumbsup: I know where a nest is about 50 ft. behind my shop at a old tree stump, I think I'll give it a try..... does it matter if it's night or day

I did my execution in the daytime, but night time might work also.

 

[Car Doc]

I use spray can BrakeKleen the flammable kind it has a fairly long spray pattern and kills them instantly. I dont know how it would work on a huge nest but it is what I would use to start with anyway. :thumbsup:

Billy the squirlly exterminator uses pyrethren spray on his TV show on wasps etc and it looks like it works pretty good fwtw.

 

[Pilot]

Got a shop vac? I read about this method in another post:

Using the extension and with the shop vac on, set the end of the extension at the hole entrance and walk away, leaving the shop vac on for an hour or so. It will suck up every yellow jacket that gets near it. When we have had yellow jacket queens get into the house on firewood in the winter, we just vacuum them up. They don't see the approaching hose as a threat and just wait for them to suck them up.

I have done this several times with 100% results: Simply take about 8 ounces of gasoline, walk up near the nest at night and from about 2 or 3 feet, dump it on the nest. No need to light it; all that does is give you some satisfaction. The gas fumes kill the critters.

Third approach is to hire a raccoon or skunk to dig up the nest. We have had one working our property pretty well this summer; unfortunately, it didn't get the hornet's nest until the night after I got stung!

 

[om21braz]

Not necessarily a good killer, but take a 64 oz. Coke/Pepsi bottle and leave about a good 1-2 ounces of product in it. Then with a sharp object, punch about a dozen holes about the size of a pencil in mostly one side of it. Leave the lid on. Place several of these on the ground in the area of the nests. It won't kill them right off, but the bottles will trap quite a few of them for you.
I believe this method was mentioned by another on this forum in another thread - and I now know first-hand that it works.

 

[zene55]

I found something everyone has and is cheap to use. Dishwashing liquid mixed with water in a spray bottle. It melts their skelton and they die. Just have to get a little on them and they die in about 30 seconds. We have used this all year and it works like a champ.

 

[cttractor]

I stumbled across this method accidently last week. We were cutting up fallen trees and branches from hurricane Irene and finished before we noticed hundreds of yellow jackets buzzing around our legs, We quickly moved away and only a few followed us, which we swatted and stepped upon. The swarm stayed near the opening to the underground nest (about an inch in diameter). We couldn't find any other entrances.

Later that day, with fallen trees and branches removed, I mowed the grass. Upon approaching the nest when I got to that area, it occurred to me that this MMM really sounds like a vortex when I'm cutting, so I slowed down. There was still the large swarm over the nest and I slowly moved through it and stopped over the nest for about 30 seconds. The swarm had parted, likely because of the sound of tractor and mower. I then resumed cutting.

When I looked back, I saw nary a yellow jacket. On my next pass, I still saw no wasps over the nest and haven't seen any since in my many forays out there to check the nest. I can only assume that the mower sucked out and ground up lots of them buggers and the rest high-tailed it elsewhere.

Because I'm sure the queen and other maintenance wasps had to stay down there, I'm not really sure why this worked. But I'm definitely going to try it again the next time I find an in-ground nest of these guys in an effort to determine whether this was some fluke or whether this method actually works.

 

[RichZ]

We have a lot of paper wasps, and I use WD-40 on them. If you spray the nest, they die in the nest, and any ones coming back to land on the nest die as soon as they touch it. Spraying it on them in the air or the ground kills them just about instantly. I like it because WD-40 isn't as toxic as pesticides. It spreads out over their bodies as soon as it touches them and suffocates them, as they breath thru spiracles in their bodies.