Youch, Mmj! I am glad you're not allergic (at least, I gather you're not) - but still, a nasty experience. Take care of yourself - baking soda bath, perhaps?

if you keep some good natural apple cider vinegar handy and flood the sting area w/ it immediately there'll be almost no reaction - slop some on a piece of paper towel and keep it on the area for 5 minutes - works every time on anyone - can prevent analeptic reactions even, or at least it does for me - just ignore the cloud of fruit flies that show up :)

Bill

I find colonial insects exceedingly interesting. If you want less wasps and hornets, try getting 10 or 11 honey bee (Apis meliferis)hives. Ever since I've started raising bees, I've noticed a decline in other stinging colonial insects. Plus, I've only been stung by my "pets" once or twice (not bad out of half a million bees).

Of course, I can't back this up at all and it doesn't even make a whole lot of sense.

Thanks drippy and squeeze. The stings were already in the "itching" stage when I went to bed last night, so no great harm done. Thankfully I'm not allergic to them, or I'd have been dead many years ago. I have a long history with Yellowjackets, and I seem to daydream my way into a nest or two each summer. I got into a nest last year on the farm, and they were the most outrageous Yellowjackets I ever saw. They were SO tenacious and angry. I went into the house, and they continued chasing me and trying to sting me. I got a flyswatter, and killed a number of them (they had come in the house on my hair and clothes), but the others kept stinging (and TRYING to sting) me, and I had to retreat to an upstairs bedroom and close the door, and kill two or three more as they came at me. Jeez, you'd think a bee would be disoriented inside a house--but not these, and they didn't seem to care that they were indoors.
And when they get angry like that, their buzzing takes on a whole new tone--you can tell they're plenty mad. And Yellowjackets actually BITE and sting, at the same time. I've witnessed it many times, and heard my relatives (who live on the farm) say the same thing.
opqdan: I found a swarm of Honeybees a few months ago, and put them in a hive; so I have ONE hive going. I used to have 6 or 7 hives years ago. Now, I'm told by a good friend who's a beekeeper, that there are two mites (one, a tracheal mite) that are really decimating Honeybees. I think I read a month or so ago that 50% of wild and hived Honeybees were killed over Winter--weakened by the mites, I assume. He took the honey from his hives about July 1, and sprayed all his bees with some sort of medication to kill the mites on their bodies. I imagine you're doing the same with your bees (in your area)?

Yeah, the mites are a fairly major problem. Luckily they aren't so bad in my area and we use a medicine to combat it (probably shouldn't say that in the organic garden forum). The biggest threat to our bees is the Lake Erie winter.

I had heard somewhere that feral (wild) honeybee colonies were almost nonexistant. The only ones that do exist are ones that swarmed from a domesticated hive.

I've never found a swarm that wasn't one of my own, but I've always wanted too.

Marylandmojo, I got stung five times last year after being caught offguard. I don't think you were daydreaming, I think they are just extremely fast in their strike. They got me through my clothes and on bare skin also. Quite painful. I was considering whether I should use something to eradicate them (since the nest was in the middle of my garden and I needed to water regularly during the summer. I went back squeamishly a few days later to find that something (likely an armadillo, possum or raccoon) had dug their nest out and licked all the combs clean. All the honeycombs were on the surface empty and the surrounding plants were matted down as if there had been a struggle! I was glad mother nature did the job for me. I didn't know yellow jackets had any predators! Good luck.

Anna: I started to mention the fact in my previous post that foxes and skunks, in particular, dig them up and eat their honey. Supposedly (I've heard it all my life from country people) foxes stick their tails in the holes and collect many Yellowjackets on their bushy tails, then turn around and dig out the combs. I've seen nunerous examples of what you saw, ever since I was a child--I find nests dug up often, and like you said, combs laying all around on the ground. My father was raised on the farm in Virginia years ago, and he told me his family had eaten Yellowjacket honey, and it was good, but a little stronger tasting than honeybee honey. He didn't tell me how they got it from the Yellowjackets, but they probably smoked them, as beekeepers do to pacify honeybees--and wore heavy clothes (that's the way I'd go about it if I wanted to try the honey). We don't have Armadillos as far north as Virginia, but I wouldn't doubt that they could dig them out also--armored, as they are.

Well, it is amazing that any animal would brave these aggressive creatures, but I'm glad they do. I hope you have the same luck! They are mean!

mojo - your dad was mistaken - yellow jackets feed primaraly on insects and larva and don't store food the way honey bees do, who feed exclusively on nectar and pollen - the pollen supplies the honeybees protein needs, the insects supply the wasps protein needs, and any sugary material they go after is immediately used in feeding the larva that will be the queens that winter over, which is their late summer/fall focus - the rest of the wasp colony dies off, whereas the honeybees need a winter food supply, hence honey storage [pollen too] - the "combs" you find from wasp nests are strictly for egg laying and brood rearing - the stronger darker honey dad had was from feral or wild honeybee nests which used to be quite common as a result of the 'swarms' that honeybee colonies frequently give off in spring/early summer - they usually don't survive long nowadays w/ the mite problems, and beekeepers are mostly better at managing the hives so they don't lose swarms

what the coons, etc are doing is eating the wasp brood, not honey, and just like bears, they will go after ant and termite nests too for the same food - larva, as well as the wasps and ants themselves - and careful! smoke doesn't pacify wasps like it does bees, it freaks'em out :)

Bill

I agree with squeeze, all the yellowjacket nests I have uprooted, have NEVER had any honey. I also have never been attacked by any swarms of yellowjackets. I have set fire to nests, sprayed the 20' wasp sprays, etc. never yet attacked.
carefull out there.

Squeeze: Read your post and did a few searches
for "Yellowjacket"--sure enough, found nothing about any Yellowjacket honey. Nice to know--and now I'll always wonder why I was given that bit of misinformation. Although
I was quite young, maybe 6 or 8 years old (and I'm MUCH older now), I'm quite sure I heard it right, and I've repeated it a dozen or fifteen times in my life. I even posted it on this forum last year, as I recall--after the Yellowjackets had chased me in the house on the farm, and were chasing and stinging me INSIDE the house. (An interesting aside--on the Ohio State University site, the first site listed, I believe, it says that if a Yellowjacket
gets inside your car or house, don't worry, because they never sting inside an enclosure. DEAD WRONG. I was chased all over the inside of my house--from room to room, and stung repeatedly, as I swatted Yellowjackets with a flyswatter. I will say, however, that I've been chased inside the house by Yellowjackets twelve to fifteen times in my life, and the attack that occurred last year was the worst I've ever encountered. Most of the time, the Yellowjackets DO get disoriented--but not last year. It beat anything I ever saw--must have been German Yellowjackets, which the site says are most aggressive). As I said, don't know why I was given misinformaion, by nice to find out the facts, lo, these many years later. I'll definitely stop repeating that story I was told! Also, I'll find out soon if there is ANY chance of there being someting that resembles honey--or just larvae, in a Yellowacket nest. I poured two bottles of Alcohol down the hole of the Yellowjacket nest--the ones that stung me a few days ago, at dusk, today. I figured they'd mostly all be in the nest then, but the sites all say to wait 'til after dark. Oh, well--MOST were in; I'll find out in the morning how many are still hovering around, and when they clear out, I'll dig the nest up and take a look. (I'll also find out if Alcohol kills Yellowjackets--it's a first time trying Alcohol. Ordinarily, if not around my food supply, I'd pour gas down the hole and light it--poof! Adios, Yellowjackets. In this instance, even though it's nowhere near the food supply, I didn't want to ruin the Azaleas.)

There's a trap that can be used to catch yellowjackets. It's a cylinder with an inverted cone in it. At the bottom of the cylinder, you put some kind of bait.

Basically, the yellowjackets smell the bait and fly into the cone, but when they get inside, they can't find their way back out because they always look around the outside edges.

Every couple of weeks, I clean it out, add new bait and hang it back up again.

I should probably point out that that's a yellowjacket trap that I've used, but there are other brands and styles that probably work well, also. You could always google yellowjacket trap to see what your options are.

yes mojo - there are quite a few different hornet and wasp species, plus a lot of wild and solitary bees, and most folks only think yellowjackets / honeybees, so I'm sure your folks just considered anything that wasn't in an actual beehive as a wild bee, which they'd translate as yellowjacket, and honey from feral hives is most always stronger flavored cuz the bees work more of the early deciduous trees and lots of weeds that domestic bees ignore in favor of the syrup beekeepers provide in early spring - lots of folks around here call yellowjackets [or any wasp/hornet] just "bees"

I'm surrounded w/ the pesky buggers every fall in my juice plant, and have come to recognize 3 distinct troublemakers - the 'regular' yellowjacket is the longer, usually fatter, one that comes after the juice and alcohol, and they're not aggressive unless you grab one or it stumbles into your hair or clothes [and they go to any perfume-y smells], then there's the smaller, jumpier version thats really a meat eater and comes around because of the sugar smells - the one that'll show up to your bar-b-q, and would really like to find the fish or chicken or beef - those will take a bite of ya if they they're excited, especially if you're waving and batting at'em - the one that's really nasty is the black and white striped one - very meat oriented, very aggressive, and will prey on the other 2 if possible - dead as soon as I see'em! otherwise I put homemade traps around, and ignore them, just being aware of what I'm putting my hands on, even w/ rubber gloves :)

all hornets and wasps are a desireable part of the eco-biology of the garden, and predate lots of real pests for us there, tho some predatory wasps prey on desireable bugs too, and they're all just a little scarey too close!

Bill

Hmm interesting on the various types of "yellowjackets" I was only aware of the small B&Y versions that eat syrupy juice and nector anything larger I consider a hornet. a wasp I consider the long bodied type with the dark coloring. there is also the black colored wasp shaped Mud dobber, although I have never been bothered by my type of YJ, or MD. I never knew there were other types of YJ's I guess I will be carefull if I see the larger type.
and the only time I bother YJ nests are when they pose a danger to my kids, they have a job to do, and I try to let em do it.

Boy, can I relate. Twice as a child I stepped into their nests and got stung all over my body. Last year they were made a nest inside one of my walls and when the weather got cold they started coming in around some of my windows. I had as many as 30 per day coming in and it continued until well into November. It was a plague. Also, I am a person that can't stand killing anything. To make it even more complicated, I have pets and the wall they made their nest in was in my office/bird room. I have a parrot and a cockatiel that I love dearly and I will not spray pesticide around them. Some days though there were so many, and I was afraid of them hurting my birds or my 2 cats even, that I'd vac them up with the shop vac and remove them outdoors. I did get strung 3 times last fall and the last time my hand swelled up about twice it's size and I had to go on anti-biotics. I was told not to get stung again by the doctor. However, I have a lovely yard in the city of Minneapolis and I have intentionally (as did the previous owner) planted things to encourage the pollinators. I have bumble bees, other wasps, (including mud daubers) and various small bees around but the Yellow Jackets are the meanest cusses. Incredibly aggressive. But they have their niche in nature and they do good as well as evil. Holes in the wall on the side of the house have been patched and I'm hoping and praying that I won't have to live through that again ever.

Squeeze: Some new information has come to light. Ever since your post, I've been perplexed. I knew my father, who was honest to a fault (and who I never heard tell a story that wasn't true), could not possibly have been mistaken. He was born (in a farmhouse) on a working family farm in Virginia, in 1906. He knew more about the outdoors than anyone I've ever seen, and definitely knew Yellowjackets from Honeybees. In fact, he taught me how to find (wild)Honeybee nests in the woods, and extract the honey. I have little problem doing it to this day (even with the scarcity of wild Honeybees). When I was a child, on the farm, and noticed a bunch of dug-up Yellowjacket combs, he explained to me what they were, and that was when he told me he had eaten their honey. Fast forward to today: I e-mailed a beekeeper friend of mine in Virginia, who I thought may know if Yellowjackets make honey. He told me they DO make honey and store it in combs. He said when he was a child (he's 70) his father designated he and his brothers to rid the yard of Yellowjacket nests in late Spring and early Summer, so his mother and sisters did not inadvertently get stung. He told me he's dug up hundreds in his youth, and found honeycombs in many of them. He told me to ask J.D.--who would surely verify this fact, as he used to charge people $1.00 to dig up Yellowjacket nests they had found, or $1.50 if he came and searched their yards and dug them up (many years ago; J.D. just turned 87 years old). J.D. has no phone (doesn't trust them), and believes a computer is akin to a spaceship; but I will see him later in the week when I go to the country.
Of course, as you mentioned, Yellowjackets do not winter over in their hives. It was only I who assumed that, after being told by my father that they made honey--I figured it was for the Winter. I NOW believe they make honey to consume during the warm season, while they are active. It makes sense to me that since they feed on nectar, why not store some?? Another interesting fact, discovered with a search. Adults feed primarily on foods rich in sugars and carbohydrates (fruits, flower nectar, and tree saps). The insects, meat and fish they bring to the nest (hive) is fed to the larvae, and the larvae, in turn, secrete a sugar-like material that the adults dearly love. This exchange is called trophallaxis. Could it be that this sugar-like material is stored, and IT is the honey?? I do not report this to diminish your information--that they don't make honey--but I assume you believe that from reading available material. Is there anyone reading this post who has PERSONALLY dug up, for instance, 25 or 30 Yellowjacket nests and can definitely state that they found NO honeycombs? I've mostly seen combs already dug up by animals--and empty. But I BELIEVE I've noticed two distinct sizes of combs. I generally, after destroying a hive, just let it be--as it usually was a burn-out. Now, I'm determined to dig up a number of Yellowjacket nests, to see for myself--and talk to J.D. Hopefully, I can start with the one I poured Alcohol in (but I fear I'll have to dig up a large Azalea to get at it). Maybe there needs to be an addendum to the literature.

well I haven't studied hornets and wasps much beyond observation, so I can't say there's no variety that doesn't make some honey, but considering the fact that they don't winter over, and that they grow the brood and nest as fast as possible, and having kept honey bees, that some years have trouble making enough honey to keep the nest, let alone store much, I'd be real suprised if they had a habit of storing food in that way, which requires evaporating the water content down to a level it doesn't ferment - any type of bee uses sugar for a quick energy hit, so I'd expect them to use the broods offering immediately

I think the problem is what folks call all the different critters - yellow jackets, all 3 kinds, aren't always ground dwellers, they make paper nests wherever convienent, and a quick google for ground dwelling bees seems to indicate there's over a hundred species, and over 4,000 different identified bee species in the US, mostly "annuals" like yellowjackets, but some of which may store 'honey' [there must be a reason honeybees are called that and yellowjackets, quite similar in appearance, aren't called 'honeyjackets'!]

also, they found "honeycombs", but were they full of honey, or larva, or just empty shells - what else would anyone call that nest cell pattern than a "honeycomb" :) I'd contact some university entymology dept and ask them about that kind of detail - folk tales, from the most reliable sources, are still folk tales!

Bill

I used boric acid crystals, the type you use to make eyewash, around the opening the one time I found one in the ground. Having been chased to the house and squeezing between the screen and the front door because my DH had closed and locked it was a very scary feeling. I don't no how organic the boric acid is but in this case it worked.