Wasps and hornets are a very aggressive breed of insect. They pose a serious risk to people with allergies to hornet stings and if they build a nest near, on or in your home, even under it you can be sure that you are in very big danger. And when it comes to getting rid of them it can be a huge and terrifying process.
The life cycle of the wasp helps with understanding how to get rid of it and why doing an early inspection of your home and property in the spring could save you from wasp nests in the late summer and fall. Wasps spend the spring and most of the summer gathering food for the new workers. Once the fall comes and the air cools the wasps stop making eggs of workers and the work stops. The workers are now free to do whatever they want and what they want is your sugar. This is when they become a problem, but that problem can be stopped before it starts. The queen wasp lives for one year. She is born and mates with males who die after. She and her sisters leave the nest to hibernate through the winter often under tree bark. When the winter ends they leave hibernation and find a place to build a small nest. This is your chance, inspect for a small pocket nest on your property and when you find it spray it with the strongest domestic wasp pesticides you can get. The queen will die when she returns to the nest, and you will be free from fall wasps attacking you and your family. That being said some nests are impossible to locate, they can make them in soffits and roof vents and even inside a wall through a hole in the mortar. They do this for protection from predators and the cold. A wasp nest on the inside can survive the winter and continue to grow into a multi nest network that can consume your home.
The best way to deal with hornets and wasps is to take precautions and act with initiative. These bugs are attracted to human homes for specific reasons, and they can be taught that your home is not one they can survive in. You can do this by handling your food properly. Compost heaps attract hornets because of all the sweet smells of rotting fruit and vegetables. They will come to your property and feed on this material and make a nest because of how much food they found. They will have guaranteed meals every day from your compost heap. The easiest way to deal with this is to turn your compost head every day. Put everything new on top and then flip the entire mound over, hiding the sweet scent of rot from the hornets.
You can also handle your outside eating better. Children love their ice cream cones, but they attract wasps when it drips on the ground. And all those outdoor dinners and bbq’s? They leave a mess on the ground that most people don’t bother to clean up because, hey, it’s outside, its help the grass and stuff. Well it also attracts hornets to your property and if you have sweet things on the ground especially then you will quickly find hornets on your property.
Your garbage is also a huge problem when it comes to hornets, they are attracted to just about any kind of rotting food, even meat if they can get a hold of it. So make sure to store your garbage in a tightly sealed container in your garage and make sure there are no smells coming from it, or you may end up with wasps and hornets in the garage.
If you want to get rid of the nest then there are steps you must take. If you watch them flying around they will often lead you straight to the nest. You should then get some gear together, a tight-fitting jumpsuit and a beekeepers hat is helpful, but they can still crawl under your clothing and sting you so take precautions to tuck everything in. You can then take two cants of insecticide and unload the whole thing both at the same time into the nest entrance. Do this at night because they will be sleeping. This will kill the nest and any wasps that try to return to the nest.
