Yellow Jackets. . .BEWARE!!!!

[aggiemae]

The yellow jackets have been awful here this year. We filled up five of those bag traps in three days!!!!

Keep liquid Benadryl on hand in case your chickens have an allergic reaction to wasp/bee/yellow jacket stings-bites

 

[XtremeRooster]

Last year (or was it the year before?) my DH was mowing the lawn and got swarmed by yellow jackets. He jumped off the tractor and ran for the door (which was closed and locked.) He was already stung at least 15 times on the legs. Well, DH usually uses the gasoline method as well, but this was so bad that we had to call an exterminator. The yellow jackets make more than one entrance and exit to their underground hive. The exterminator (2 gentlemen with nothing but a powder in some old oil-can looking things and no protective clothing) puffed this stuff around and in the holes. They came back at night and dug up the nest which was the size of an old 32" television, extending under a large rock. There was also a second nest buried close by. We have not had a problem with yellow jackets in that area since then.

PS I was locked in the house, hiding in the bedroom, watching from the window. Bock Bock Bock.

I suggest you call a professional exterminator, so they can locate the hive and remove it as well as treat all the entrances and exits.

That is how I wound up in the hospital with over 100 stings. Mowing my granfathers field, by the time I made it to the front porch I was covered in yellow jackets. Before that I did not know the demons nested in the ground. I grabbed a cushion out of my grandmas rocking chair and began beating them off me. I also did not know that they will attach to you and unlike a bee can sting more than once. I was beating them off of me with a cushion, the next thing I remember is waking up in a strange place looking up at flourescent lights. I said where am I? A nurse came into the room and held up a jar of yellow jackets they had picked off of me. They had cut my Levis jeans off, there were probably a hundred yellow jackets in that jar. I told her I beat that many off with a seat cushion.

I had passed out and did not even know it. I was mostly stung on the legs but had quite a few stings on my arms, back, stomach, and face. They went up my pants legs, up my shirt and covered the outside of my pants and shirt also. My poor grandfather was so upset he almost had a heart attack, he kept apologizing to me. I told him papa you did not put those bees in the ground how where you supposed to know they were there? Who knows as many times as I was stung they might have killed my grandfather if he had been mowing.

They determined I was allergic to wasp and bee stings, but not highly allergic, so I have to keep Benadryl with me everywhere I go. If I get stung I have to take 50 mg of Benadryl ASAP.

The Benadryl actually helped me when I was bitten by a Black Widow Spider, I started having a reaction to that bite, my freind says do you have any Benadryl I said yes it is in my toolbox in the truck. I had forgotten I had it, that bite is the only one I have had that actually began causing my windpipe to close off. If I had not taken that Benadryl I would have had to go to the ER with that spider bite and have an epi pen injection.

Didn't mean to write a novel but some of this is good info. A couple of years ago I got bit by a Brown Recluse spider. I went to the ER the doc says oh that is not a spider bite it is probably MRSA he gave me a shot of antibiotics and sent me home to apply heat to it. Several hours later my leg began swelling immensly and red streaks started running down my leg, I started feeling really sick. I went back to the ER thankfully the old grumpy doc was not there and a younger doc was there, he agreed with me that it was a spider bite. With the Brown Recluse it took way longer for the bite site to become noticeable. This doc says Do Not Apply Heat to a spider bite APPLY COLD! Applying heat to it actually sped up the spread of venom in my leg. The brown Recluse bite was way more painful than the Black Widow and I wound up having surgery on my leg to remove the bite site because it had become necrotic.

I hate bugs.!

 

[DrFeathers]

I just poured a cup of DE on the opening of an underground yellow jacket nest that is 4' from the back door of my house. Amazingly nobody was stung all summer until me, in the face, on Sunday after my wife asked me to plant a new flower bush near the spot. Trying no chemicals since it is in a prime free range spot for my chickens, and also right by my barbecue.

I thought sweet, powdery vengeance was mine until I read this thread... hopefully the DE will be more effective this time!

Die, yellow jackets, die!!!

 

[kristendhalstrom]

Ugh I cant find the nest......some of you said the ground?

 

[DrFeathers]

Watch closely and there is probably a concealed hole under a plant somewhere they are coming in and out of.

PS: the DE did kill those yellow jackets. Dead and gone, never seen again

 

[Morgsgirl]

My bug guy devised a cool awesome thing. He would take a tennis ball slice it and insert his sprayer nozzle through it. Tennis ball plugs the hole and you can spray away. Only drawback was stragglers returning to the nest while treatment was ongoing.

 

[drumstick diva]

Yellow jackets had found a small opening(skinnier than my pinky finger) by the outdoor garage light- so they would get in the garage wall. I put up sticky tape and caught many. I sprayed wasp spray and killed many. They would fly near while I was killing them and for some reason didn't bother me at all.

Their seemed to be an endless amount of them. I finally bought Sevin powder. I didn't have anything to adminster it. Got a hair dyeing applicator bottle with long tip. Cut the top back some to make a bigger opening. Used a funnel to get Sevin into the applicator bottle. Then climbed up on small stool and blasted the wasp entrance hole, till the Sevin was all gone. Stuck chewing gum to cover the hole and got the heck out of dodge.

Next morning found dozens and dozens of them inside the garage at the base of the wall.
They were either dead or dying. Swept up the carnage and dumped them outside. Every time I came back to the garage wall - many more were laying there.

This went on for weeks. It is two years later and when I pass that wall I still find dead wasps at the base. It's getting spooky. But never seen any flying around.

At that time I also found a ground nest. It had one small opening and I watched wasps go in and out. I poofed some Sevin in the hole- lots of it. None came out. So then I flattened the whole thing with my shoes. Never had anymore in that area.

 

[Dona Worry]

My way of dealing with wasps is hiding and getting someone else to drench their nest in that foaming wasp spray.

I am deathly allergic to wasps. I will not tolerate them.

 

[Lula-belle]

Yellow jackets hate peppermint oil. I use a mix of peppermint essential oil, 30-60 drops in 2 ounces of water and 2 ounces of rubbing alcohol. I spray it on my clothes, NOT my skin (is an irritant) and keep the sprayer nearby when out in the garden or pasture to keep them away. Several traps set up 20 ft away from areas I access until I can find the nest. Yes, MISERABLE CREATURES!!