PONYTAIL PALM is home to a large family of YELLOW JACKETS!!

My Ponytail palm has a large swarm of yellow jackets living in or under it. In zone 6, it will soon be time to bring it in for the winter. If I don't bring it in soon, I am afraid I will kill the plant. But in order to bring it in, I'll have to kill any number of yellow jackets. My DH was stung earlier this year by a swarm of these same YJs (he ended up on prednisone), and it seems like I'm the only one who thinks the plant is worth saving! The guy at the hardware store said to spray them at night, when they're asleep in their little beds. Maybe smoke, like beekeepers use? I feel a committment to this plant! I'd be very appreciative of advice or suggestions.

xxxxx, Carrie

I feel your pain. I had a nest of them in a pot of jade plants and got a nasty sting on the thumb when I tried to bring the pot in for winter. Wasp and hornet spray will definitely kill them but I don't know how the plant will react to the spray. Yellow jackets nest underground so you should be able to locate their entrance and keep the spray going in the hole until you see no more fly out. I've killed two colonies this way.

The other thing you could do is try to drown them. Put a stream of water on their entrance hole and keep it going. It would be ideal to submerge plant and pot in a big tub of water to insure their demise but who wants to pick up the plant with angry yellow jackets? If no movement occurs after several minutes of spraying water then you might attempt submerging the pot in a tub of water. You could also cover/plug the hole with something while you move the pot. It is a risk either way.

Cold weather will do them in, but may also kill the plant.

I had a nest under my mugho pine, and used the spray, which successfully killed the YJ, but I think it did serious harm to the pine tree. I'd suggest the hose treatment, but I would do it at night when it is quite cold, since they are very sluggish when cold, and then walk away for 20 or 30 minutes with the hose running. Water might not immediately kill the eggs or pupae stage, so I'd suggest keeping that in mind. Maybe you could fill the YJ hole afterwards with sand, which the Ponytail shouldn't mind. Good luck, and keep us posted on what you decided, and what works.

Susan in Minneapolis

I managed to kill a rosebush with wasp spray once when I was trying to kill yellow jackets so I wouldn't recommend using it around plants unless maybe you rinse it off right away (without rinsing it off the yellow jacket nest of course!) If they are really yellow jackets and not some type of other thing that looks like yellow jackets, they close up shop for the season sometime in the fall so you may be able to wait until they leave, then bring the plant in. Only question is whether they give up for the season before it's too late to save the plant from frost, that I'm not sure of. Or if the plant's in a pot and the YJ's are living under it and not inside it, you could sneak out in the night and grab the pot and move it to a new spot while they're sleeping, then bring it inside the next day once you're sure they were living under the pot and not inside it.

I think that Ponytail Palms can survive up to 28 degrees F. If the wasps are only down to 32 degrees then we might have a moment or two that we can get the plant out of the pot, rinse the bottom off, repot with fresh soil. I like the idea of moving the plant to a different spot after dark, so we'll only have to deal with the YJs.

xxxx, Carrie

The yellow jackets will still defend their nest despite cold weather. It was close to freezing in late October (years ago) and dark, and I knew the jackets were there but thought the cold weather would do them in. Was I ever wrong! That is when I got a very hot sensation on my frozen thumb due to the one jacket who was buttonholing me. Needless to say I let the darn jade plant out for another day or so. I finally decided I would flush them out with the hose. That did the trick. The cold weather and water kept them so lethargic, that I pulled the plant out of the pot and hosed off any remaining jackets so I could take the plant inside (the jackets and the pot could just freeze). Remember that the ground and plant are acting like insulators for these menaces and that the plant will probably succumb before the jackets do.

On another note, I had a huge hornet nest in a Chinese privet that was between the front of the house and sidewalk to the front door. No one ever got stung. We left them alone and they left us alone. After we had a few freezes I cut the nest out of the bush and shook the remaining pupae out. It sat in my garage for years. I thought one day one of my daughters would take it to school for show and tell which they never did. Finally I threw it out.

Maybe it's a different sort of YJ's over there vs out here--I had them several times at my old house, each year they will make a nest in a new spot, and they're there in the summer but then come fall or winter they disappear. No idea where they go, but I did a lot of fall/winter pruning and digging in the area where the nest had been in the summer and no problems so they definitely weren't there anymore.

They are the same here - one season and then they're gone. But until they are completely gone, be cautious. They ain't dead until Jack Frost sings!

Of course I went out this afternoon to clean up some more of my lot and must've disturbed a nest in the woods. I got stung 3 times. I thought it was 4 times but maybe that was still the burn from the fire ants a little earlier today. So tomorrow it's wasp and hornet spray buying time.

But see, the ponytail palm is potbound, as they seem to prefer. So if I try to lift the PTP, it doesn't come out, the YJs do. I'm going to have to cut the (flimsy plastic) pot off. Any clues on rain? It's raining today.

xxxx, Carrie

If the YJ's are in the pot itself then there's nothing you can do but wait. My suggestion to try and move the pot was only if you thought the nest might be in your garden soil underneath the pot or very near it, but if they're inside the pot then I would leave it alone.

It's on the patio (where all my houseplants have their summer vacation). I think they either are in the plant itself or in the dirt under the root. I haven't repotted one of these in so long; I can't remember quite what's inside. Doesn't it have just the one huge root?

If you find Wasp Spray that works, do let me know. The stuff we keep buying at HD doesn't do much.

And wait - what does zone 9 consider winter? If I were in z. 9, I would leave it ouside year-round and let the wasps play all day!


xxx, Carrie

Here winter means a bunch of rain, and a few days of light frost. But the YJ's still disappear in the fall or winter, so I don't think their behavior has anything to do with temperature. The wasp spray that I tried was Raid, the one in the black can that says it's for wasps, etc. If I could have sprayed it into the nest, I'm sure it would have killed them because I've used it very successfully to kill individual wasps that I could spray it on directly (they drop dead pretty much instantly, so I know the stuff works!). But the problem with the YJ's is it's hard to get it into the nest without risking being stung. I waited until evening, then went as close as I could and sprayed right at where the hole leading to their nest was, and the next day my yard smelled like wasp spray but the YJ's were still there happily buzzing around! So I don't think it's the quality of your wasp spray that's the problem! And if you get enough of it close enough to the nest itself to do any good, I think it'll do nasty things to your plant.

Aha! I'm learning more about these wretched creatures every day! My DH has sprayed a variety of different Hornet Sprays in the hole we thought was leading to their hideout and has repeatedly assured me they were All Gone. On several separate occasions I have proved him wrong, but never when he's home. Dark is beating him home these days! I guess just on a basis of longitude you must have more daylight than we at this point.

xxxx, Carrie

Well, hopefully you don't have to get stung to prove to DH that they're really not gone yet! I don't know if we have much more daylight than you--I find myself rushing home from work so that I can take my dog for a nice walk before it gets dark, I think it's getting dark around 7:15ish these days, but seems like it gets earlier every day!

Buy the spray that is a direct stream. It kills on contact. I thought all wasp and hornet sprays were the same but the one I picked up at HD today was a foaming spray and didn't seem to have the same effect as the ones I've used in the past. I will check the nest tomorrow and see if there is any activity. If there is any activity, I will buy the direct stream spray and wait until the activity dies down and then start spraying the hole (you can use this stuff from 20 feet away). They will start swarming out of the hole but as long as the stream is still going they will all die trying to defend the nest.

Maybe your husband did kill all the yellow jackets from this nest and what you're seeing are other yellowj ackets from other nests in the neighborhood.

Again, read the labels to see if it has adverse effects on plants if you possibly want to save the plant. You could also wrap the plant at night cautiously with plastic bags and tape, then submerge the rootball at your leisure if you want to drown them.

I have another idea - can you put the plant into a plastic bag?the whole thing or at least the dirt so the bugs can't get out? if the wasps can't get out to eat - they will starve and die..... we had a ground nest one year, put a big glass jar over the hole and just left it there. no more wasps...... love that!

whoops - hcmcdole - i just re-read this thread and saw that you had the same idea! better read more carefully next time.

I had a similar problem w/ yellow jackets so I called my pest control guy. He recommended using wasp/hornet spray, either very early in the am or very late in the afternoon. Apparently they are inactive at those times. Still spray from a distance. For good measure, treat a 2nd time the next day. Their nests are in the ground (carrie, in your case - pot soil). I did what he said and it worked like a charm. The colonies do move to other spots (not necessarily nearby) so it's best to be alert at all times. I don't remember seeing them in the cool season, but maybe I just haven't stumbled on them. I don't know.

Okay. I've been stung viciously by YJs by getting near their underground nests and what I want to know is is there a way to prevent them from nesting? I didn't even see the nests and didn't see any swarms to warn me. They were just suddenly all over me. Two years ago I got stung so badly that I had to go to the ER for morphine (10 times at once that year, three times at once this year). I keep Benadryl on hand, but still, I'm beginning to develop a real phobia (maybe I should change my name to YJphobic).

Does anyone know a way to prevent them from nesting in the ground? They, of course, always prefer a spot in one of my garden areas or near a shrub. Darn things.

ever who can prevent their nesting underground or anywhere, would become a multi-millionaire and i'd put down the first amount. i, too, keep benadryl in my pocket, esp., this time of the year.

Pour concrete over your lawn would probably prevent them from nesting but I don't think that is what you want.

I don't know of anything that will prevent them but generally if you don't disturb them they are okay. When you walk over their nest though you become a big moving target. The best thing is to be aware of multiple yellow jackets in the same area - that is as good an indicator of a nest as any that I know of. See where they are flying to and out of so you can spray late evening or early morning.

This year we were helping my dad cut trees in his neighbor's yard and move the logs to his wood pile. After the second day of cutting and moving I noticed lots of swarming yellow jackets near the trees we were cutting when we were riding by on the lawn tractor. There must have been at least 3 nests (entry holes) of yellow jackets in a 15 foot circle. The neighbor brought his wasp and hornet spray down but due to their swarming, it was almost useless. I told him it would be better to wait until they settled down and then begin spraying but instead of waiting he poured gasoline down each hole. After an hour or so, we saw no more yellow jackets. It's hard to believe that no one got stung with all this activity going on.

My husband's doctor (upthread when I say DH was stung by a "swarm," I'm being pretty literal - we figured about 100 separate stings) said the Benadryl doesn't help on these type of stings. I am not an MD and I have never played one on television, nor have I ever been stung by a YJ.

You can put out traps and try to catch the queens in the spring--I've never tried it so I don't know how well it works. It's obviously not a 100% guarantee since you're relying on catching the queen, but there's no harm in trying, it certainly can't hurt.

Thanks, everyone, for all the suggestions. I have purchased two traps today, since we are in the process of a major overhaul of our garden areas, so I'm hoping they'll help. I try to keep an eye out for the vicious little beasts, but they always seem to find me!

Helpful Hint: For any type of sting (wash, hornet, or bee), keep some meat tenderizer on hand. It must be a natural type that contains PAPAIN, a natural enzyme that breaks down protein. If you get stung, ASAP wet the stung area (licking it is the fastest) and generously sprinkle meat tenderizer on the area. Rub it in, keep rubbing to dissolve the salts, and within seconds (or a few minutes if you've been delayed getting it on), the pain will be gone, swelling reduced significantly, and you're back to whatever you were doing. The enzyme breaks down the venom, which is a protein. Works like a charm every time, unless you can't get to it for more than a few minutes. (I'm a retired elementary teacher, and this helped stop short many tears and pain on the playground!) Papain is technically a protease (a special type of enzyme that can hydrolyze proteins) in the juice of an unripe papaya. (By the way, it won't make your fingers fall off if you need to leave it on for while!)

(Trying to imagine licking DH from neck to knees ASAP and applying meat tenderizer.)

Now we're getting a little kinky!

If I knew how to wiggle my eyebrows here I would! LOL
In past experience, the yellow jackets have been found where there are tree roots and/or leaves. A preventive measure would be to remove old stumps and roots and keep the area free of mulches, pine straw, leaves, etc. At least that is their MO here... good luck!