Posted on 08/28/2014 6:53:16 PM PDT by bkopto
John Birkett, of Longwood Services Pest Control, said removing the 3ft (91cm) nest from a bed in Winchester (UK) was his most unusual job in 45 years.
He said it would have been "extremely dangerous" if the homeowner had tried to remove it herself.
"I just stood back in amazement," Mr Birkett said.
The nest was discovered by a woman at her house in St Cross, in an unused spare room, where a small window had been left open.
Mr Birkett believes it may have taken about three months to build.
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.com ...
A gardener friend of mine told me that paper wasps are doing the job honey bees usually do. I have a small paper wasp nest under my patio roof and I see them regularly bringing little yellow globs back to their nests.
I still get confused by the difference between wasps and hornets, and which ones come after you...........
Gives new meaning to “Bed and Breakfast”!
She could get quite a massage!
scary
When I got back to it about two weeks later, a yellow jacket colony had moved in and claimed it.
I wasn't going to spend money on an exterminator that late in the year when I could employ mother nature and deliver death by a thousand cuts. Shortly after the first hard frost, I bored into the nest with one of those big drill taps.
Anything in the bee family is very lethargic when it is cold. Of course, they got to work repairing it as soon as the day warmed up.
I got up early in the morning for the next several days to repeat the process. The yellow jacket repairs followed. Finally, one morning just before a heavy rain, I dug a channel which drained right into the hole. That drowned most of the colony, but they still were not beaten, so I bought some of that Halloween dry ice to finish them off. Finally, Halloween night, the neighbor kiddies were able to walk into our yard for the treats unmolested.
You've got to admire the persistence of the wasp family. Not as smart as spiders though . . . take down spider webs a few times and they figure out another place to build.
These are all my "pets" as I cannot have a cat or dog right now.
Not too keen on yellow jackets. I would like some bats.
I don’t bother wasps at all. Yes they can sting but they are harmless. They move out of my way and if need be I throw them outside.
3 months to build and apparently not noticed during that time? One heck of a house keeper I’d say.
They do bore big holes and should be patched if you have termites in the area.
Yes, Carpenter bees. The beams are high enough that termites haven’t been able to reach them. I did have termite damage closer to the ground. I know that smoke makes those bees lethargic. Case in point, I had my grill right under one of their holes and a bee fell onto the hot grill. He died and that made me feel bad. I moved my grill to another location.
Just got a new car last week. On Sunday, my wife and I were driving up to the beach, taking on its first long trip, a beautiful day. All windows down.
Driving north on Route 1, a hornet flies into the car and lands on my thigh.
Normally, this isn’t cause to wreck a new car, but I don’t like having the damn thing sitting there, so I swipe at it.
I miss, and to my horror, the damned thing flies up the leg of my shorts.
I am now butt-off-the-seat, swiping at my shorts with one hand as my butt gyrates in the seat at high speed, and “F**K! F**K! F**K!” coming out of my mouth.
The damn thing stung me three times on the back of my thigh where it meets the buttock. Felt like having a lit cigarette touched to your leg.
I like honeybees and even bumblebees (though I have a story about them) but wasps and hornets, I eradicate them with prejudice and without mercy any time I see them.
We watched that movie “A Walk on the Moon” a while ago, it takes place in upstate New York, during the woodstock weekend. It’s about a Jewish family summering in a bungalow colony. Towards the end of the movie one of the kids disturbs this pretty gigantic wasp nest that’s just hanging off the side of one of the buildings.
Hubby and I thought it was pretty ridiculous that there’d be this huge nest right there.
It does make you realize how beautiful that part of the country is, it astonishes me that that whole area is basically dead as a resort area. Definitely due for a big comeback.
Many hours of work went into making that afghan.
“Don’t let the bedbugs bite.”
doing the jobs American bees won't do...
You should see the BBC movie “Collision” - kind of like Sliding Doors but with more of a sting.
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