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Common misconceptions
Removing unwanted yellowjackets
Allergies and stings
Other wasps (links under development)
Misconceptions about yellowjackets
The answers provided here are mostly for southern California
and possibly northern California. They will not pertain to
many of the northern or eastern species
Misconception: Yellowjackets are making nests under the
eaves on my house.
Most of those insects are not yellowjackets, those are paper
wasps. Paper wasps make a nest consisting of a single comb,
typically under the eave of a house or in a protected cavity
like a pot or other container. With paper wasps, you can always
see the comb where the young are being raised, and the wasps
tending to them. Yellowjackets typically make their nests underground
or in cavities, there are many levels of comb and the nest is
always covered with a paper envelope. There are one or two
species in the local southern California mountains that do make
aerial nests that can be under the eave of a house but again,
it will be covered with a paper envelope and will be much larger
than a paper wasp nest..
Also, paper wasps have elongate bodies with a thin, wasp-like
waist. Yellowjackets are more stocky and the waist is not apparent.
Misconception: Those aren't wasps, those are bees.
Many people think yellowjackets are not wasps because they
are do not have long thin bodies. Instead they think yellowjackets
are bees because of the similarity of the body form. Some people
even refer to yellowjackets as "meat bees" because
of the similarity which doesn't help sort out the confusion.
Yellowjackets are indeed wasps. They seek out protein in the
form of flesh like insects, carrion and unfortunately, our food.
Removing unwanted yellowjackets
How can I get rid of yellowjackets from my property?
Yellowjackets have been a pain for decades. Control methods
used against yellowjackets work with varying degrees of success,
however, some insecticides have been removed from sale because
of high mammalian toxicity, environmental concerns and other
regulatory issues. There is no silver bullet that can rid your
area of yellowjackets.
Can I get rid of yellowjackets by using the traps?
Probably not. There will always be more yellowjackets being
produced in the nest to replace them as you kill off the foragers.
The true method of control would be to eliminate the nest.
Couldn't I get rid of the yellowjackets by finding the
nest and killing it?
In theory this is the best strategy. However, yellowjackets
forage for about 1 mile from their nest and therefore, if you
wanted to get rid of all the yellowjackets flying around your
property, you would have to locate every nest within a 1 mile
radius and eliminate it. In urban areas, this would mean searching
around all your neighbor's homes. In natural areas, this would
mean searching every tree trunk, rodent burrow, stream bank,
pile of rocks and trash heap to see if there were yellowjackets
in there. This would be basically impossible.
There are either bees or yellowjackets flying in and out
of the wall of my house. Does it matter which one it is?
Most definitely. If it is yellowjackets, then they have
a paper nest inside that is full of larvae and wasps but not
much else. If you have the nest exterminated by a professional
exterminator (we don't recommend you attempting to kill off a
yellowjacket nest by yourself unless you know what you are doing),
then there may be a little smell of decaying insect bodies (maybe
1000 to 3000 wasps and larvae) but overall, the nest can be killed
and that should be the end of it.
In contrast, if you have honey bees in the wall, the proper
procedure is to have the hive exteriminated, then you have to
rip out the wall exposing the honey and comb, remove it, repair
the wall and then MAKE SURE YOUR PLUG UP THE HOLE AFTER THE COLONY
IS REMOVED SO ANOTHER BEE COLONY DOESN'T MOVE IN AGAIN. You
can't just kill off a honey bee colony and then ignore it. It
could easily have 100 lbs of honey in the walls. Once the bees
are dead, there is no way to control the temperature inside the
cavity, summer heat will melt the wax, honey will start coming
out of the comb and you could have honey leaking through your
walls and window sills. In addition, a dead honey bee colony
with all that honey is very attractive to other animals like
rats which might start working their way into the crawl space
of the house. And then there is the smell of a decaying honey
bee colony with 40,000 bees and another 20,000 larvae and pupae,
fermenting honey, the works. And you can't just seal off the
hole because the bees will live for a long time and start looking
for a way out, possibly chewing holes into plasterboard and such
in attempt to find an escape route.
Allergies and stings
If I am allergic to bees then will I be allergic to wasps?
In general, no. The honey bee venom protein that causes
anaphylactic shock is different from the yellowjacket venom proteins
causing a similar reaction. So therefore, you can be allergic
to honeybees but not yellowjackets or yellowjackets but not honey
bees. There are a few people who are allergic to both. They
either developed hypersensitivity to both honey bee AND yellowjacket
venom or they are the rare group of folks who are allergic to
a minor venom component found in both insects which is used as
a spreading factor to spread the venom more efficiently inside
the mammalian body.
Other wasps (links under development)
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Misconceptions
and Frequently Asked Questions