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[nafex] Re: Paper Wasps
del,
If it is a large long mostly black wasp that makes football shaped
paper nests in trees, I would just not do anything to bother the
nest. These wasps are meat eaters, they eat loads of flies. I've
watched them efficiently pick fly after fly off the outside of our
kitchen screen window.
We had a football sized nest under the north eave of our house. I
left it there and never bothered it, and instructed my kids to do
the same. The wasps would fly into the side of my head and bounce
off and just go on there way many times when I walked by close to
the house. None of them ever stung me.
I left the nest hoping the wasps would return the following year,
but none did. The nest is still there, like an ornamental paper
mache sculpture. I've stepped on their nests in the bush once or
twice by accident. I moved out of the way pretty quickly and they
didn't pursue me.
Yellow jackets are another story. They were so large in numbers a
few summers ago that they hollowed out pits in almost every
raspberry in our small patch. Our kids quit picking early apples
from the trees because so many of them had small hollows on one
side, so sometimes they'd pick what appeared to be a good apple
and there would be a yellow jacket inside a hollow on the other
side eating away. I've had yellow jackets chase me over 50 yards
one time when I stepped on their nest opening while picking wild
blueberries.
Otherwise, if you want to move them or whatever, insects are
the least active in the coolest weather.
Dan Mason zone 3, NW ON Canada
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