Paper wasps! Need your opinions....

I discovered a huge paper wasp nest under the eaves of our house the other day. Now I know they are beneficial to the garden and they are usually docile unless you bother them. The nest is in an out of the way place. Is it wise to leave it and let the wasps do their work in my gardens? Or would it be better to get rid of it before they become active?
Thank you, Joy

Hi Joy,

My first thought would be, do you have curious small children to be concerned about getting stung and having an allergic reation?

Sharon

That sound funny. I guess I should have said do you have small children that are curious about things, such as bugs.

This message was edited Friday, Mar 16th 7:37 AM

HI sharon, It's just my husband and me. We do have small grandchildren that visit but they are both afraid of bugs of any type. :) The nest isn't located in an area we frequent. And it's up high. Joy

Hi Joy,

Then I would leave it alone. All pollinators welcome! should be a sign for any garden! LOL!

Sharon

Thanks Sharon, That's what I was thinking. But they do look a little scary! And I wasn't real sure! I welcome all beneficials, even got over my fear of spiders because I wanted them in my gardens. Joy

Hi Joy,

Spiders I'm not afraid of. Snakes...gives me the hebegebes just thinking about them. I know they play a part in the food chain. So I stay out of their neighborhood. I hope they stay out of mine!

Sharon

Just a note on the wasps...my neighbors had a nest on our side of the yard under a hose holder that got to about the size of a basketball.

One day our dog was out in the yard, bit one of the wasps and the whole nest came after him and he was stung in over a hundred places on his body. He was swollen for days.

At that point I insisted that they take it down because the boys always play back there and I was afraid they would accidently crush a wasp. Maybe these are a different type of wasp, they are extremely aggressive and attack in groups.

We had wasps build a nest once. It was under my sister's bedroom window. She's allergic to stings. We ended up calling out the Pest Control people. Keep an eye on it I'd say.

I'd take it down and move it away from the house before any of the pupae have hatched for this year---if there are any in the nest--the adults don't overwinter, they die. They'll just build themselves another nest for this year, anyway, and I wouldn't want them to build it on the house. An outbuilding or something that you don't frequent would be fine. It's better to be safe in the first place. A person's allergies can change over a lifetime, and you never know if that next sting will trigger enphalactic shock or not. Better to not risk it, if it can be safely moved now.

I have lots of wasps around my house. Both mud daubers and the ones that make paper nests. I almost never have tomato hornworms! Are the two related? That is do the wasps kill the young tomato hornworms?

We have a wasp nest too. We can't see it but they seem pretty active. DH got a Salmon head and suspended it over a 5 gal bucket, filled the bucket with water to about 3/4 full and added about an inch of motor oil to it. As the Salmon head started to rot in the sun the wasps were all over it. They are such voracious eaters that they gorged themselves and can't fly. So they fall into the bucket and get caught in the oil. We got about 150 the first day.
CB

I would leave it alone. A friend lost a son-in-law to wasps...he tried to remove a nest from the garage and was stung 3 times on the face. He died before the paramedics could do anything. He had never been allergic to stings before. Teach the children respect for these creatures and there should be no problems.

Hi Joy;Were I you,I'd do everything to get rid of the nest-as beautiful and amazing a piece of natural sculpture as it might be.Some years ago I was helping to clean up a backyard-I reached down to pull some long grass at the base of a willow tree(too close for a weed whip)and disturbed a nest inside the tree(!!)-within seconds I was covered in wasps-I had someone turn the garden hose on me full blast as I headed for an open patch of earth to spread mud on me-nothing stopped the angry bees.They followed me into the house,stinging as we all went.As I was leaving to be rushed to the hospital(over 150 stings counted by the doc. in emerg. as he packed me in ice after the shot he injected)we noticed a huge paper wasp nest hanging under the eave of the house-point being they don't restrict themselves to the turban nests they build.Even one sting is extremely painful...I now must carry an epi pen as I am a landscaper out there in their world.500 stings even if you aren't allergic will kill you.Who needs to find out the hard way when a nest is pretty easy to take down?

My raspberry patch was invaded with yellow jackets this year.
I sprayed them because I'm allergic to bees, but they re-built time and again. Eventually I found them all over the eaves of my garage, in my dog kennel, in my forsythia, in my lilacs, and inside all of the crevices around the eaves of my house.
I didn't know that they were in the forsythia until one stung me to defend the nest while I was digging under it.
Until now I have only reacted to honey bees, but even with full doses of benedryl my forearm and wrist swelled significantly. I'm sure that I have a full sensitivity to them now like I'm allergic to honey bees, and I'm now afraid of them for the first time. They are all over my house and yard. I wait until early evening or morning to kill them so that I'll get most of them in the nest.
I felt bad about this because I'm sure they may be beneficial in some way in my yard, but I have to be able to be in the yard also.
My whole community has been infested with them the last two years, but my own yard has never had a problem like this.
I would advise you to get rid of them before they are that bad for you, because sometimes it's very difficult to find all the millions of places that they will spread to next year.
Last night I went out around dusk to cut down the old canes in my raspberry patch. I was pretty nervous about it considering my experience in the forsythia, so I took a can of spray with me. I had made my way through about a third of the patch when it became just too dark to see anymore, so I went inside. Of course I returned to the task this morning, and was so terrified to find that if I had continued I would have been badly stung. The very next bush I was going to cut down had a huge nest in it. I am so grateful to what-ever stopped me from touching the next cane. I still have a few kids that need me around.
I finished the patch today, but I was very scared through the whole experience. Get rid of the nest before you have any of this fun.
Biride

A link about what yellow jackets offer us:

http://biology.uoregon.edu/enhs/archive/jan98/jan983.html

I'm still going to nuke any nests too close to the house, though. Being attacked by a cloud of hornets is not a good thing.

I too would get rid of it and it's occupents. I got 17 stings while clearing out a friends over grown garden. They are welcome to come visit my garden and go back home as long as it is not attached to my home. Also had yellow jackets in an old tree stump last year. Luckily they sent out a couple to warn me when I got to close with the lawn mower. And I luckily knew what they were trying to tell me. Got rid of the nest and the stump soon after.

Sandy2

Thanks for the information on the yellow jackets! I knew there must be some use for them, but I'm still frustrated that I cant' go into my garden without threat.
My husband found an article in the paper the other day saying that the kind I have in my yard is a European strain that until now has not lived in Utah. They have open-bottomed nests and they are more prolific and poisonous and aggressive than the occasional yellow jacket that we sometimes found around.
I think that I could keep a small family alive for a year off the larvae growing in my yard alone.:)
I hope that they will kill some of the other bad insects in my yard, but I think that they are the "baddest" bug around right now! Maybe after they conquer, they'll leave?
Good luck to all future recipients of this wonderful European strain. You'll never understand until they move in with you.
For now, I guess I'll limit my visits in my yard to early morning hours only because it doesnt' matter how many I spray, they just call in the reinforcements.
Thanks again, Birdie

we have had terrible problems with hornets this year!!
Is it me or are there tons of hornets, grasshoppers and lady bugs this year.
We had a paper football nest right by the entrance to the house-took it down, now they are trying to make a new home under the siding-by the entrance! I have to many kids of all ages going in and out- we've tried everything to get rid of them. Im going to have to tear down the honeysuckle to get to them, but they have to find a new place to call home!!!!!!
dori

Larkie, we used to live in a town that had a flourishing honey company. If you had bees, they'd come take them off your hands for free and if you had wasps they'd come dispose of them for a small fee. We did get wasps a couple of times and if I remember right, they'd pop a large garbage bag over the nest. Can't remember if they sprayed in the bag first.

It seems to me it would be worth calling in an exterminator if you can't get rid of them on your own.