Lorna, why did you take your hummer feeder down, because of the ants? You could have just purchased an ant moat to go on top of it or purchase a feeder that has an ant moat. Is there a problem with killing ants too, are they beneficial, cause here at my home I have millions that invade my yards and land and even my home every single year. I was told I have several colonies. I think sometimes they live in my walls. As far as wasps go, they like to build around my back door, they do not bother my hummer feeders, like the ants used to. But......they do get into my house a lot since they build right next to the back door. And there is nothing like having flying wasps in your home, along with ants. I do nothing about either, except kill them when they are in my home.....and use an ant moat for my feeders. Now if I was getting wasps on my feeders, I would probably do something about that. Whenever my daughter tries to weed eat, she get hoarded by bees and gets stung sometimes. I suppose it is the kind that burrow in the ground. She is 16 and scared to death of bees, but still does it. What do we do about this situation? I think in certain situations, you have to do something, whatever that might be, good or bad. Do you get JB's? What do you do about them?? I am at a loss because I think I am going to lose a large tree because of them.

Hi I was just reading a book called Common sense pest control. It suggests that having a large problem with yellow jackets and wasps indicates something that is attracting them. One thing that is the biggest attractant of these, is garbage, or sweets or meat outdoors. Either pet food on a dish outside, or bottles put out for recycling that have not been rinsed. Or rubbish barrels that do not have secure covers. When I read that it made sense to me, as we had some old garbage cans with holes in the bottoms and no covers and although I haven't seen any insects around them, I don't go near them too often and I don't put the rubbish out. We have replaced the cans with new ones with locking lids. I hope this will improve the situation. Adam

Yes, those red wasps are "special." I destroy their nests when I find them near the house or garden. Other wasps are positively jolly compared to the "evil red wasp." They always try to build a nest in my pump house and, there's a little hole in the door, from which they can peek out and attack unsuspecting passersby. Every spring I place a can of wasp spray on the other side of the pump house. Then when I go past there, I peek around to see if there is a sentinel in that little hole. If there is, I pick her off and spray into that hole. After doing this a couple of times I finally open the door, some night, wearing a red night vision light, and finish off the nest. Dawn's point is well taken. Here's my story about sensitivity to bee (honey bee) stings. I grew up orcharding in NJ. Yellow jackets were abundant and one of the jobs my parents gave us boys was to pick up drops. So we got stung frequently. It hurt, It burned. But I could hardly find the site of a sting, a couple hours after the fact. Then at age 13 I started into keeping honey bees. Those honey bees were exceedingly docile. I might have gotten stung twice, the first couple of months that we had them, and I was in that hive, working it, a lot more than I should have been, perhaps once a week. When I was stung it would swell a lot. It hurt more than a yellow jacket sting. And, it took about three days to go away. Then, one day I was stung twice. One sting was under the arm. Within an hour I was covered in a rash and itched badly. My mother took me to the emergency room, where they gave me a shot of adrenaline, which straightened everything out in minutes. At one point my mother stated to the doctor, "Well, I guess that's the end of bee keeping for my son...." I started to protest (typical teen). The doctor then replied, "Not necessarily. You'll probably know the next time he gets stung. The reaction will either get less or it will become more severe. I went back to bee keeping and the reaction gradually decreased. I never had another rash. But I did swell, sometimes for three days, after a sting. Keep in mind, that for me, as a bee keeper with 3-5 hives, I was only getting stung, at most, about a half dozen times per year. At age 18 I left for college and didn’t keep bees again until I was about 28. By that time I was in Mexico by that time. Again, the bees I purchased there were very docile. But within six months the Africanized bees arrived and took over. So suddenly I was dealing with aggressive bees. I started getting stung about, say, 20 times a year, maybe a little more. And, I still swelled, but not so much. It would go down in a day. After about 7 years of this I had an encounter with a “bee war,” in which about 8 hives of Africanized bees got into a fight on the grounds of the Bible institute where I was teaching. They went berserk, stinging people all over campus. I was called upon to settle the war. So I donned my protective gear (which I had never used before dealing with Africanized bees) and went out to try to settle things down. During that encounter I was stung nearly 80 times. I couldn’t count, but I counted stings even if there was no stinger to be found at the site of the sting. I ran back into the school and chugged some antihistamine and then went out to finish the work. Interestingly… I didn’t swell. I also noticed that, from that day, stings didn’t hurt a fraction of what they used to! I kind of liked this new arrangement. But I also recognized that my risk for a serious reaction had just gone up. Not to swell or react to a sting is actually an indication that one’s immune system has actually developed more of an immune response, which could eventually become dangerous. Anyway, I enjoyed this new state of affairs for a year or two, and then the school asked me to get rid of the bees, as they were simply too aggressive. I then went without bees for about 5 or 6 years, purchasing some more when we were living in NJ. By that time, my reaction to bee stings had returned to normal. I swell, but not terribly. Stings hurt, but not as badly as when I first started beekeeping. And, with the kind of bees we have in the USA, I’m back to getting stung rather infrequently, even though I work my hives every so many weeks during warm weather. So, that’s my story. I believe it illustrates a fairly normal immune response to stings. Just keep in mind that the venom between wasps, hornets, yellow jackets and honey bees is different. Having a given reaction (or lack of reaction) to one kind of sting doesn’t mean that one will have the same with another kind of sting. George

Hey guys..I am getting no time in towns when there is a library open or else I have no time. We spent 2 days in Austin and had a wonderful time but I never got to a library and also it was too fun to be inside :) I really appreciate the cheers from everyone. We are in Wimberly TX tonight at an EMS station that lets cyclists stay with them. I can only have these few minutes. Maybe in Del Rio I will get more time LOVE YOU GUYS ! c