Forum Index > Full Moon Saloon > Huge wasp nest in the garage. Time to call in the experts?
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Tom
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PostFri Sep 29, 2017 12:48 am 
Was poking around in the garage looking for a box of furnace filters and while unstacking boxes in an oft visited corner I got stung by a yellow jacket. High tailed it out of there quick and got some wasp spray. Donned a body suit and headnet and used a 12' decking board to pull back the last box and found this. After cowering in fear I summoned the courage to unload a can of wasp spray. Barely put a dent in it. Went back and bought 3 more cans and doused it good. Still have wasps flying around in the garage and on the ceiling and walls. Time to call in the experts? On the outside I see a pipe that wasn't fully sealed leaving a small gap where the wasps found their way in and built this massive hive. I estimate it to be 16" in diameter. 16x20" furnace filter for perspective.

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jbsimm2
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PostFri Sep 29, 2017 5:51 am 
Burn down your house. It's the only way to be sure.

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treeswarper
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PostFri Sep 29, 2017 7:38 am 
Read the directions on the can. It usually says to spray during the night when all the wee beasts should bee in the nest. During the day they are out and about. Diesel works too, but might not be a good thing for indoor use.

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InFlight
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PostFri Sep 29, 2017 8:50 am 
Wow, that's damn impressive nest indoors. You could try to coat their entry point with the lots of spray and try to kill them off slowly that way. Hitting the outside of the nest with spray might not be very effective unless it is broken open, concentrate on the nest entry. None of these insects have any real night vision. You could try hitting it with something late at night (preferably moon-less) to break it open. Baseball, long pole trimmer or similar, then run away. I hit a high outdoor one in the eave with a water spray. Once it's open, you can douse it with spray another night with great effectively. The two ones in the ground I burned. A Plumbers torch duct taped to a pole does really quick work! I watched a few of them try to attach the flame!

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DIYSteve
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PostFri Sep 29, 2017 8:53 am 
You may have killed the hive but the wasps that were outside the hive when your sprayed it continue to live. That's how it happens. The key now is to prevent the surviving hornets from recolonizing and building a hive. The above assumes that there is no existing hive inside your wall or elsewhere. About a month ago I killed a hive located on the outside of our house. Some wasps survived. A week later I found a new hive under construction. I zapped that. I have not found a new hive under construction and I have seen only a few individual wasps since then. I will continue looking for new hives.

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Kim Brown
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PostFri Sep 29, 2017 10:52 am 
Great Caesar's Ghost, that's big!

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MtnGoat
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PostFri Sep 29, 2017 11:22 am 
Better living through Chemistry. Keep nuking it, it will die. I had one not quite that big near my shop, it took four cans and a week, but I did kill it.
Get a couple of the yellow, tall wasp traps at Home Depot and put them up, it will nail the stragglers.

Diplomacy is the art of saying 'Nice doggie' until you can find a rock. - Will Rogers
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Damian
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PostFri Sep 29, 2017 11:44 am 
Agree w/Goat. You'll win. We had a massive one in our attic once that filled half a large shop vac when finished.

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Pyrites
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PostFri Sep 29, 2017 1:10 pm 
Twenty-five years ago FDNY HazMat actually had the ‘Better Living Through Chemistry’ moniker painted on their lead Mack. I doubt they’d get away with it now.’

Keep Calm and Carry On? Heck No. Stay Excited and Get Outside!
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Navy salad
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PostFri Sep 29, 2017 6:00 pm 
I've read about "free wasp nest removal" in the past (apparently they use the venom to make an anti-venom serum) and a google search turned up some hits, so you might check that out. However, the ones I read will only do the free removal if the nest hasn't been sprayed, so maybe this isn't such a great idea....

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AlpineRose
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PostFri Sep 29, 2017 6:22 pm 
That picture is going to give me nightmares.

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Tom
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PostFri Sep 29, 2017 10:40 pm 
MtnGoat wrote:
Better living through Chemistry.
After leaving things to chemistry for 24 hours there's no sign of life tonight. I think the stragglers just needed time to revisit the doused hive. Going to leave the hive as is for another night just in case.

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Malachai Constant
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PostFri Sep 29, 2017 11:01 pm 
After I used wasp nests outside I always would soak them in kerosene and torch them. I would not suggest that in your case doh.gif .

"You do not laugh when you look at the mountains, or when you look at the sea." Lafcadio Hearn
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Chico
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PostSat Sep 30, 2017 2:10 am 
Navy salad wrote:
However, the ones I read will only do the free removal if the nest hasn't been sprayed, so maybe this isn't such a great idea....
Yep, no chemicals! If you're going to kill them make their little lives mean something. They'll freeze and grind up and make the serum out of that concoction.

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Chico
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PostSat Sep 30, 2017 2:12 am 
Malachai Constant wrote:
After I used wasp nests outside I always would soak them in kerosene and torch them. I would not suggest that in your case
Ah come on. Want to read a funny story in the news about some joker burning his house down down trying to kill wasps.

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