I didn't film the actual removal but I thought ya'll might like to see the end result!
yellow jacket_0001.wmv (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSZ1JxfJ0Xg#)
Scott
Scott,
We know honeybee queens won't sting you. Can you verify that a yellow jacket queen does or doesn't :-P
kill her. no mercy for the queen of pain!
Robo, one of the most fierce stings I've ever gotten was from a queen honey bee. I guess I really angry her off by holding her wings and she lifted her abdomen around to catch the end of my thumb...doesn't happen often, but can happen.
I didn't play with the YJ queen enough to find out about her sting, but I looked really close and couldn't see a stinger...doesn't mean she doesn't have one.
Kathy, don't worry, she won't be getting out of that bottle anytime soon but she really is a beautiful thing. Was thinking of casting her in resin??
Scott
Its amazing how much larger a yellow jacket queen is than their workers. I would say nearly 4 times larger and yes, they do sting!
...JP
hey guys, why are the queens out in the spring? do they have to mate every year, or are they just looking for a new nest? i kill them when i see them in spring.
Under normal conditions the yellow jacket colony does not over winter. The annual goal of any surviving colony is to build in size enough to produce as many FOUNDRESSES (virgin queens) and males in the final brood. Note; once the queen begins laying the eggs for these males and foundresses the workers will destroy all other larvae so that the males and foundreses recieve all the colony's resources. Upon emergence the foundresses will be bred by the males (which die just like the honeybee drones) and the newly mated foundresses will seek shelter for the winter and will be the sole survivors of their parent colony and will establish a new colony the following spring.
Down here in the south though mild winters can allow yellow jackets colonies to survive and they can become huge and very dangerous. I have personally observed one of these multi year nest that totally encompassed a sofa.
Kathy, I got this info from a pest control operator and is second hand so please take it with a grain of salt.
Although I haven't researched it at all it's my understanding that YJ queens need to fend for themselves in spring to start the "nest". They will feed themselves (forage) until strong enough to start a nest to begin laying a work force. Once they have workers they get down to doing their queenly duties to expand the colony and in the fall will set up the next years queens. I was told that the majority of YJ colonies don't survive even mild winters. This may be why you see (supposedly young) queens in spring.
Although I understand that this applies to bumble bees, I haven't bothered looking into the life cycle of the YJ. I suppose because I just flat-out hate the buggers.
Once again this is all hearsay.
Scott
David. we posted at the same time...hope I didn't step on your reply...fascinating!
Scott
i knew they didn't overwinter here. always wondered about the queen. i know i will never mow my fields again in late summer early fall. they can just go wild until we have a couple of good freezes or spring comes! :-)
thanks to you both for the info.
Feed the girl a little and see how long she can live in that bottle. Then find something cool to do with her. Don't let her go to waste. Caste her in amber and make a walking stick or something out of her. Did you get a video of you doing the removal?
And on the jackets dying during the cold, last year after the frost had killed out the tomatoes, me and the then 3 year old were pulling up the baskets and rolling up the hog wire for the cucumbers and beans. We park them every year under an old oak tree by the garden. Well I noticed we messed up a nest of jackets under the tree. I do not know the time of the year, it was cold and all the summer plants were dead so I am sure we had some freezing nights. We got the tractor and with the forks dug them up. It was almost dark when we dug them up and we put coat hoods over our heads just in case so I know it was cold outside, but they did not fly very high.
Now there's a new thread..."what to feed to a YJ queen"!
Scott
Tuna, honey, sprite, and maybe dead honey bees. Anything.
This reminds me of an incident a few years back when I had techs working for me (I was a manager for another outfit back then). I "discovered" that yj have visual acuity similar to honeybees at least when returning to their nest. This one was the european yellow jacket aka aerial yellow jacket, alike in all ways to the ground nesting eastern save for their affinity for nesting above ground in structures. My tech had been out a couple times to one of my accounts to treat a yellow jacket nest in the wall of a third floor condo. Now once there he could not locate the nest for love nor money. Other than a singe yj or two he was at a total loss. If memory serves he made three seperate trips and each time the tenant complained of yj entering around a certain window. Well long to short he called me in out of desperation. I really didn't know what I could do as this was the best I had ever trained and he was a fully qualified PCO before I ever got my hands on him to turn him to the light of nuisance wildlife. Well we did all the usual searches plus hanging out the window by our heels to inspect the casing, no nest or holes found. We were puzzled to say the least. So we commenced a ground search of the building the see if the nest could be some thirty feet below.
While standing in the yard below and gazing up at the window above it dawned on me. The window and the ell it was in was identical to the window and ell in all the units along the back of the buildling, just like a row of hives all painted the same and the same height. I turned to my tech and told him to go the the third floor unit one down from the one we had found no nest in and tell the occupant that he was there to treat the yellow jacket nest in her sun room. By God, I was right!
That's interesting David. Until this year I had never seen a YJ nest above ground. I've had "honey bee" calls twice in the last month that turned out to be YJs that had above ground nests, this one which was in a roll of carpet padding in a shed and another that was on the side of a palm tree concealed by ferns. Are these "European or aerial" YJs a new invasive specie?
Scott
Not new nor particularly invasive but definitely common. Did I tell you that they will eat through sheetrock to make room for nest expansion. A nice lady returned from vacation to find this.
(http://img227.imageshack.us/img227/4425/th0000149.jpg) (http://img227.imageshack.us/i/th0000149.jpg/)
They were entering through the small hole in the brick to the right of the of the window.
(http://img261.imageshack.us/img261/8670/th0000146.jpg) (http://img261.imageshack.us/i/th0000146.jpg/)
Cool pic. Eating through sheetrock should not be to much different from eating through hard Georgia red clay to make a nest.
I got a call from a lady who was cleaning her house-she saw a spot on the celling -while she was vacuuming-when she used the tube attachment to try and remove the spot -all the face paper on the sheet rock pulled away-and she
was run out of her house by angry yellow jackets-yes they eat sheet rock-yellow jacket invasion are easy money -reason being thers litel mess to clean up not like a over head sofit filled with honey raining down on you 8-) RDY-B
More than one of the calls I've gotten have been the result of poking the funny looking spot. Better them than me I say.
Here's a tip that I learned from one of the best I ever worked with. Yellowjackets, though this could apply to honeybees as well, in a wall that was brick on one side and lath and plaster on the other. When I saw it I just knew it was sawzall work and could just envision the radial cracks and destruction of the horsehair plaster. This little lady I was with, who like I said was the best I ever worked with, whipped out a hole saw and made the nicest round hole through the plaster without the first crack. As long as you don't run into expanded metal lath your good to go with hole saw.
yes masonry always presents a problem-- the worst is the fireplace chimney-when the colony is in the void between the flue liner and the brick-drilling of tactical holes is a life saver-RDY-B
Fireplace work is always a mess when it comes to honeybees. I can deal with almost anything else without a mess (squirrels, raccoons and bats come out to be caught or excluded and don't leave enough of a mess behind to worry about) honeybees though are a PITA in masonry of any sort. Ever see them in hollow cinder block? I'm not a brick mason and since masonry is almost always a support structure ) I don't open it up for any reason. Trap out and rob out is about the only course of action for me or it gets reffered to a PCO and the homeowner takes the chance on honey flow.
I did one that was semi exposed in the top of an antebellum chimney (no flue liner). It was just below the top opening and reachable the issue was that anything knocked loose was free falling to the firebox below. I lined the lower fireboxes with plastic and commenced work but try as I may I still made a mess of things and honey flowed for three days. The sweep that came in after me to clean up what I couldn't didn't appreciate it one bit. LOL
Another antebellum I did (1856 and the oldest brick home in that part of west Alabama) was one of the easiest I have ever done. The chimney had been capped off some time back with a piece of plywood with a metal cap (something like a telescopic cover). All comb was freehanging and attached to the plywood only. A simple lift and flip of the cap and I was home free. I wish they were all that simple.
Are yellow jackets and wasps like honey bees in that once they have built a nest in a certain spot, they will nest there again because of scent left behind? i.e. if I knock a nest down, should I be concerned that they will nest in that same spot again?
I've had several calls on eastern YJ's that nest in above ground structures.
They will find voids in walls, by windows, under eaves, in gutters, behind siding just above the foundation, lots of similar places that honey bees would find themselves.
ornery critters
Quote from: ldaxon on November 17, 2010, 12:12:34 PM
Are yellow jackets and wasps like honey bees in that once they have built a nest in a certain spot, they will nest there again because of scent left behind? i.e. if I knock a nest down, should I be concerned that they will nest in that same spot again?
No. I've knocked down probably a hundred or so bald faced hornets nest and dug up or out probably the same on yellow jackets and maybe half that many european hornets and have never observed a nest in the same spot twice. If left untreated; ie, the reproductives and foundresses are allowed to live and overwinter, there will often be nests near the area of the original nest. Just a location thing not a return to the natal nest.
Now here's one I see quite often with red or mahogany wasps. Specific structures may be plagued with annual recurring issues in the spring. Invariably these are structures that allow the foundress access to the soffits and attic where they overwinter. When the first warm days of spring arrive they will emerge enmasse and look for all the world like a swarm on the loose all around the roofline of the struture. Left untreated these structures will often have an increased number of nests around it as could nearby structures.
The protocol for treating these structures are either a general fogging of the attic , if good penetration of the soffits can be assured, or a crack and crevice treatment with a good insecticidal dust of the soffit/roofline either from the interior or exterior or better yet crack and crevice followed by fogging. Be sure that the dust is a residual like Delta so that next years that try to enter get a taste. This can even be followed with an exclusion as well being sure to seal all of these gaps that are allowing entry.
I no longer offer this type of service as I have chosen not to be a PCO in addition to my wildlife work.
I can still do the hornets and yellow jackets though as a shop vac does wonders without the need for chemicals.
BTW, ask me about carpenter bees :)
Oh, here's another one that I have seen return to the same area. Cicada Killer wasps and digger bees/wasps. This is not a case of returning to the original nest either but because of soil type being suitable it will be attractive year after year. This is much the same as mason bees returning to a stack of straws when available.
BTW, none of these are dangerous in anyway but they can freak out the general public especially the inch and a half long cicada killers.
QuoteUpon emergence the foundresses will be bred by the males (which die just like the honeybee drones) and the newly mated foundresses will seek shelter for the winter and will be the sole survivors of their parent colony and will establish a new colony the following spring.
I thought the queen mated in the Spring. You use pheromones in a wasp trap so that game me the idea that they mated in the Spring. If they mate in the fall what does the pheromone do?
Actually, I have never seen a yj mate so I am going by the literature that they breed in the fall. The yj traps that I'm aware of use sugar as the attractant. I don't trap them so IDK.
The only one I have used had a pheromone that supposedly only attracted the queen. We purchased property recently that had a carriage house where the attic was covered with wasp nests. To be on the save side we bought a wasp trap and only got one critter. There were some wasps flying around this year but nothing what we expected based on how many nest were in the carriage house.