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Author Topic: Yellow Jacket horror story  (Read 9692 times)

Offline Beeboy01

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #20 on: November 07, 2012, 02:30:16 pm »
I had to deal with an in ground YJ nest last year that was bigger than a basket ball. After a can of wasp spray slowed them down some I dumped a box of moth balls into the hole and covered it up. I finally wiped them out but it took some work.

Offline D Coates

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #21 on: November 07, 2012, 04:03:01 pm »
The one time I had one in the back yard, I waited until night fall and poured a pot of boiling water gently down the hole.  Those who tried to get out were killed immediately by direct contact with the water.  The "survivors" were steamed to death in the underground nest.  It was cheap, easy and more fun than I like to admit.  They'd gotten me good 4 or 5 times while mowing the yard the day before.  The was a dead patch in my yard about the size of a softball for about a month but it closed in and life went on.  The gasoline takes a whole lot longer for the grass to grow back.
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Offline BlueBee

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #22 on: November 07, 2012, 08:10:09 pm »
OK, I’ll certainly get flamed for saying this, but I think dumping gasoline into the ground is idiotic.  Sorry.  While most will probably evaporate and just contaminate the air we all breath, some may seep down into your well water and contaminate it.  It only takes 5 parts per billion of benzene to contaminate your water.  Try to sell a house sometime with a contaminated water supply.

After actually digging up a ground dwelling yellow jacket nest this summer, I doubt some of these methods are going to be very effective to begin with; at least not against the nest I dug up.  The location of the real nest underground was a good 3 feet (horizontally) from the entrances.  By the time I got done digging, the lawn liked like a scene from the movie Caddyshack.  Nothing poured down the entrance holes even had a remote chance of getting to the actual nest.  Yes, vapors might, but in concentrations high enough to kill the insects?  I’m skeptical.  (I’ve tried to kills moles and gophers before with smoke bombs; vapors don’t work on them either).  

Offline Intheswamp

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #23 on: November 07, 2012, 08:14:42 pm »
Yes, vapors in amounts large enough to kill insects and the vapor will spread quickly and thoroughly. 

I agree that using gas isn't an environmentally friendly tactic but neither is filling the holes with other types of poison...such as smoke bombs, but I'd bet that gasoline vapors would take out the moles.

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Offline BlueBee

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #24 on: November 07, 2012, 08:25:11 pm »
I think the moles in Michigan may be a little hardier than your moles in Alabama  :-D

Offline CapnChkn

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #25 on: November 08, 2012, 09:27:46 am »
I can't believe nobody has addressed the obvious, after all the talk about Trap-outs.  Before anybody takes the trouble to point out the flaw, that the YJ's would simply go back into the nest around the cone, I would like to say that it would also be obvious to direct the cone into a cage instead of letting them fly.

Covering the hole would cut out the light.  Leaving the funnel, which can be made of window screen or #8 cloth, if you're a purist, to be the source of light and the way out for workers.  Nothing would have to be sealed off, just block the light so the funnel "looks" like the way out.  A good chunk of scrap plywood, and dirt piled around the edges.

Eventually the nest would be depleted and the problem would be solved by mice or some other animal seeking protein.  The back entrance can be blocked, or covered with a second funnel trap.  Alternatively one could lure the insects in by baiting, possibly with tuna fish.

If there's any doubt, you can see the trap I wrote into an "instructable" 5 or 6 years ago.  I regularly trap a half 15 oz Peanut butter jar full of flies in days this way.  I haven't had problems with the YJ's, I've been having super robbing problems and I suppose the robber screens have been confounding this kind of action on their part.


[url=http://www.instructables.com/id/Fly-Trap]http://www.instructables.com/id/Fly-Trap
[/url]
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Offline BlueBee

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #26 on: November 08, 2012, 10:03:38 pm »
 X:X X:X X:X

Nice Instructable CapnChkn and good idea.  

Looks like you might have found a mutant fly for the photo in step 1.....or maybe photoshop  :-D

Offline CapnChkn

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #27 on: November 12, 2012, 07:26:38 pm »

Photoshop?
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Offline sterling

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #28 on: November 13, 2012, 04:23:22 pm »
OK, I’ll certainly get flamed for saying this, but I think dumping gasoline into the ground is idiotic.  Sorry.  While most will probably evaporate and just contaminate the air we all breath, some may seep down into your well water and contaminate it.  It only takes 5 parts per billion of benzene to contaminate your water.  Try to sell a house sometime with a contaminated water supply.

After actually digging up a ground dwelling yellow jacket nest this summer, I doubt some of these methods are going to be very effective to begin with; at least not against the nest I dug up.  The location of the real nest underground was a good 3 feet (horizontally) from the entrances.  By the time I got done digging, the lawn liked like a scene from the movie Caddyshack.  Nothing poured down the entrance holes even had a remote chance of getting to the actual nest.  Yes, vapors might, but in concentrations high enough to kill the insects?  I’m skeptical.  (I’ve tried to kills moles and gophers before with smoke bombs; vapors don’t work on them either).


  
My neighbor kills moles by putting a hose over his exaust on his lawn tractor and inserting it into the mole tunnel and lets the tractor idle for a time.

Offline BlueBee

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #29 on: November 13, 2012, 04:55:52 pm »
OK, here’s a photo of my “work” digging up my first yellow jacket nest.



You don’t want to see the mess I make trying to get rid of moles  :-D  
I wonder if I could stuff some grits into my mole hills to get rid of them rascals ?

Offline sterling

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #30 on: November 13, 2012, 07:40:56 pm »
OK, here’s a photo of my “work” digging up my first yellow jacket nest.



You don’t want to see the mess I make trying to get rid of moles  :-D  
I wonder if I could stuff some grits into my mole hills to get rid of them rascals ?


I wouldn't waste grits on a stupid mole. He ain't worth a mess of grits. :-D

Offline Sparky

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #31 on: November 13, 2012, 09:55:32 pm »
I think this might be the culprit:

http://www.masterbeekeeper.org/stinging/gianthornet.htm

This is the kind of hornet that was hanging around near the house in a bush in later part of summer. Them boogers can take a pretty good dose of spray before they are killed.

Offline tefer2

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #32 on: November 13, 2012, 10:12:30 pm »
Bluebee, you sure you didn't step on a landmine there! :-D

Offline BlueBee

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #33 on: November 14, 2012, 03:17:08 am »
No, I save the explosives for the moles  :-D

As I noted earlier in this tread, I had yellow jackets move into one of my foam nucs this summer.  Here's a photo of what they did.



The buggers seemed to like my foam nucs too.  This is a 4 frame nuc (top cover is on the left side of photo) that I was going to super for winter....until I found the bottom story was packed with yellow jackets.


Offline rober

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #34 on: November 14, 2012, 12:09:01 pm »
here's a fun way to get rid of moles. it's kinda' pricey. i looked at the segment on how this thing is built & saw that the gas mixing section is part of a mixing head type cutting torch. i hooked a rubber tube to my cutting torch & put a bent piece of copper tubing on the other end to insert into the mole tunnel. i then pulled the hose from the bent copper & ignited it with a propane torch. the results were the same as in the rodenator video. if you tried this on the yellow jackets i think you'd end up with a lot of p.o.'d yellow jackets. the hassle is rolling the torch to where it's needed. a mini set of gas bottles like they use in junkyards would be ideal for this.

http://www.rodenator.com/

here's a newer copy cat of the same thing...

http://www.rodentblaster.com/
« Last Edit: November 14, 2012, 12:24:30 pm by rober »

Offline ScooterTrash

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Re: Yellow Jacket horror story
« Reply #35 on: November 14, 2012, 09:24:25 pm »
Thanks for the X-Mas recommendation; http://www.rodentblaster.com/
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