Please make note that I am just telling of past experience an NOT suggesting anyone try this. I am a native of Michigan now living in Arkansas. Growing up we had a small orchard of apples, pears and plums. In the late summer/early autumn as the fruit was ripe ready for harvest, at times the ground would be covered with fallen fruit, drawing oodles of honey bees. Being the ignorant kids that we were (stupid may better describe us), we could and would often catch the bees with our bare hands cupped together. We found that as long as we didn't crush or pinch the bees they would buzz around in our hands looking for a way of escape. Granted we got stung a time or two but were always ready, willing and able to try it again. Saying all that to reinforce that "honey bees" are not aggressive out in the field. Now, if you tamper with their dwelling place that's a different story. A lot of us here would LOVE to have a colony near us for pollination purposes. Seeing a honey bee is a rarity in my neck of the woods. You are blessed. Do what you feel you need to do to be comfortable and feel safe in your own back yard! Good luck!

I would love to have more pollinators and I garden organically and plant specifically to attract them. I haven't had a problem with Ground dwelling bees at this point. Just a few paper wasps that try to move in to the underside of the canopy over our front door every year. I keep my eye out for them and knock it down while it is still small and they move on. And I've been gardening here 30+ years. It's pretty sad that there aren't enough pollinators even when I am offering an environment that is pollinator friendly. I have berry bushes in the yard and strawberries, that are not developing berries from all the flowers on them. Still, I remember my brother running over a bee hive with the lawnmower when we were kids. A very unpleasant experience that can effect the way you feel about bees for a long time. So, I can understand the concern people have for colonies in their lawn, which you cannot avoid. I wonder why they chose the lawn? Is it because there is a bare patch or what? Is there a way to make your lawn a less hospitable site for a nest? Jessica, I love your idea about keeping the site wet because they like dry. I guess I would try running the sprinkler constantly to see if that would get them to move on. I've done that with ant colonies and it worked well. I guess there is no way of relocating them either? Another question I have, for those who see a nest of bees as a challenge and are willing to poison them. I wonder if you have ever tried to grow food? I don't think most people in general are aware of how challenged our food supply is and how much of a problem that could end up being with dwindling numbers of bees. I've actually come across an organization that is exploring some kind of 'food substitute' and calling it 'Soylent Green' based on a movie of the same name. That concerns me, that there are people who have recognized how bad things could get and now consider it a real possibility that we won't have food in the supermarkets. Or be able to grow it ourselves. Something to think about.

It's not just salt water they want. We have a fresh water pool and it's not so much the water, but the white pipe around the return from the pool filter. My husband made valves where the water returns to the pool with 2 different shut offs. Depending how you adjust them one pipe returns the water directly in the pool. One has a spray head that sprays the water into the air over the pool to keep the water cooler in the summer because it gets way too warm if not. We live in South Texas, enough said and with adjustment it also makes water run down the slide.. The honey bees congregate all around the center of that pipe and more and more keep coming. Last year it was the white stair rail going into the pool, however we've been blessed so far, they are not aggressive at all. When I hook up the pool vacuum, I have to have my face ,hands and arms right in the middle of them swarming around me to get it hooked up and they haven't even attempted to bother me, Thank God!! I was a little concerned at first, but so far so good. Anyway, just saying, it's not the salt.

Imp, For some reason, my DH is also a bee/wasp/yellow jacket magnet every time he walks out the door, but especially when he is mowing. Normally, it is the male cicadakillers who are aggressive and sting. (Hmmm, not surprising, is it?) It is sort of 'shocking' to watch one insect attack and subdue another. I sometimes see the same kind of battle between praying mantids and other insects. We also watch the argiope spiders (we have very, very many and some have had their webs in the same spots for months now) catch their prey in their webs quite often and it is very entertaining, especially when they are dealing with big old grasshoppers. With all the cicadas we have here in our rural area, it would take a billion cicadakillers to subdue them all, but I suppose the cicadakillers we have do help control them somewhat. I am sorry they're damaging your hostas. If I had hostas and they were tunneling around them, I am sure I'd be just as irritated as you are. The area in our landscape that the frequent the most has perennial Four O'Clocks which have tuberous roots that can get as large as a football, so the tunneling from the cicadakillers doesn't harm them. I used to have hostas in that spot, but then discovered that in our area the word 'hosta' is another word for 'deer chow'. To keep the cicada killers from digging, you'd have to put down something relatively solid like cardboard or cloth or plastic that they can't tunnel through. They love mulched areas because the mulch keeps the ground softer for them and makes it easier to tunnel in it. I have heard of folks mulching with gravel or some other form of decorative stone to deter them but haven't tried it myself and can't say I'm sure it would be a good solution here since rocks absorb heat and we have too much heat as it is. I suspect your hostas wouldn't appreciate heat collected/reflected from a layer of rock mulch. I don't even know of a natural predator that preys upon cicada killers, although there must be one of some kind. Dawn