Related video from M Wandel: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OM4Nku2qAiI&pp=ygUVTWF0dGhpYXM...
Wasp Blower
21–30 of 103 posts
Re: Wasp Blower
#22I was more impressed when Emily the Engineer built an actual Wasp Launcher - https://youtu.be/mEn2kA0cAGw
Re: Wasp Blower
#23I see a lot of advice being given in these comments, and I find it a little alarming that my own preference hasn't got a mention.
Just leave them be?
I've had plenty of wasp nests in sheds, roof spaces, garages etc and never had a problem peacefully coexisting with them.
Almost everyone I've spoken to about it shares this sentiment, and generally wouldn't do anything about it unless it was in an especially risky location.
I get the impression most commenters here are from the US, whilst I live in the UK. Am I naive to the aggression of American wasps, or is it just more acceptable to kill creatures you find bothersome over there?
Does anyone with experience both sides of the pond have any insight?
Re: Wasp Blower
#24It's amazing how much DIY problem-solving comes out of necessity. Always interesting to see the basic household tech getting repurposed in a creative ways.
Re: Wasp Blower
#25I see a lot of advice being given in these comments, and I find it a little alarming that my own preference hasn't got a mention. Just leave them be? I've had plenty of wasp nests in sheds, roof spaces, garages etc and never had a problem peacefully coexisting with them. Almost everyone I've spoken to about it shares this sentiment, and generally wouldn't do anything about it unless it was in an especially risky loca…
If you have (young) kids, having active/plentiful wasps nearby might just not work. Wasps can be scary, especially to children who have been stung before, and they are super-impractical around kids eating/snacking, too. "Close your mouth and relax" just doesn't get through to a scared kid, in my experience. :|
Re: Wasp Blower
#26Horror. The spiral birth factory, stepped terraces of the hatching cells, blind jaws of the unborn moving ceaselessly, the staged progress from egg to larva, near-wasp, wasp. In his mind's eye, a kind of time-lapse photography took place, revealing the thing as the biological equivalent of a machine gun, hideous in its perfection.
Re: Wasp Blower
#27I see a lot of advice being given in these comments, and I find it a little alarming that my own preference hasn't got a mention. Just leave them be? I've had plenty of wasp nests in sheds, roof spaces, garages etc and never had a problem peacefully coexisting with them. Almost everyone I've spoken to about it shares this sentiment, and generally wouldn't do anything about it unless it was in an especially risky loca…
> Am I naive to the aggression of American wasps
Yes. Yellow jackets are very aggressive. Having them live in or next to your house is just asking for an injury.
Re: Wasp Blower
#28I see a lot of advice being given in these comments, and I find it a little alarming that my own preference hasn't got a mention. Just leave them be? I've had plenty of wasp nests in sheds, roof spaces, garages etc and never had a problem peacefully coexisting with them. Almost everyone I've spoken to about it shares this sentiment, and generally wouldn't do anything about it unless it was in an especially risky loca…
Maybe you have friendlier wasps in the UK, but the common ones in the US (yellowjackets, mud daubers, etc.) are generally very aggressive, and trying to coexist with them will end badly sooner or later.
I'm vegetarian because of personal ethics. I safely capture and release spiders I find in the house. I use live traps for mice and rats, and release them in the woods. But most wasps here are on my "nip the problem in the bud" list, along with termites, Scotch Broom, and a few other things.
I leave non-aggressive wasps, like Great Golden Diggers, alone.
Re: Wasp Blower
#29This summer, we had a white-faced hornet nest, in a bush, a few feet from our front door, so it had to go. Normally, hornets are great. They are nowhere near as aggressive as yellowjackets (unless you mess with the nest), and they eat yellowjackets, so you either have hornets or yellowjackets, but not both (but they also eat bees, so people who want to encourage pollinators, need to discourage them). But that low on…
Why didn't he just move it to another place? Hornets are a threatened species.
Re: Wasp Blower
#30I tend to use a shop vacuum to get rid of undesirable wasp nests. Fill the tank with a few litres of water so the victims have something to drown in, point the tube at the nest entry or whatever entry the wasps use and switch it on for an hour or so. As soon as there is some disturbance most of the resident wasps will exit the nest to defend it so you'll get the resident population in only a few minutes. Keep the vac…
I do this as well, but put in about an inch of water with a few drops of dish soap. Instant wasp kryptonite. I have a few extension tubes so I can just lean it up against the house and watch as they are sucked in coming in or out.
It is absolutely hypnotizing.
It won't kill an entire nest late in the season, but will knock down their numbers so that they aren't as prevalent.