Beneficial Insects: Not All Bugs are Bad
(Page 7 of 8)
April/May 1995
By John Vivian
Hornets and Wasps
Least-appreciated among insect predators are the colonial or solitary vespid wasps. Many build mud or paper nests on or near buildings, others overwinter in the warmth of houses—and they will all sting if stepped on or if nests are disturbed. Too many people go for the wasp spray can when they see a paper wasp building her nest under the porch eave, a boring wasp entering or leaving a nest under the house siding, or yellow jackets flying into an opening in a stone wall. The big globular gray-paper nests of pale-faced (whitefaced) hornets built high on barn walls or in trees are favorite targets of rockthrowing or BB-gunning youngsters and a few misguided adults.
All these insects look meaner than they are. They are slick shelled, black or black and yellow, with none of the appealing plump fuzziness and big eyes of a honeybee. The sound they make when flying is a fierce buzz and some ar aggressive around humans. But, they are greatly misunderstood. Paper wasps ( Polistes species) build upside-down umbrella-shaped paper nests in the eaves of barns and porches and raise their broods in full sight of humans. When establishing their territory in early spring, overwintered females will drop down on passersby; grazing the back or your neck or brushing the dog's nose with prickly dangling legs. But they have no intention to sting and won't unless you grab them. Not even swatting them out of the air elicits a sting. Once the nest is built, they quit hassling you and will sting only when the nest is attacked. Though they live on nectar, they catch bugs—mainly plant-eating caterpillars—and chew them up to feed their larvae.
So do all the other vespids—though most prefer to avoid human dwellings. Potter and mud daubers are solitary wasps that lay single eggs in a series of mud nests, then stock each with an anesthetized caterpillar the young will eat alive.
Like bald-faced hornets in their treetop paper-cone nests, colonies of yellow jackets ( Vespula species ) capture thousands of "bad bugs" to nourish larvae raised in large paper nests they build in holes in the ground or in fallen trees or walls. The adults, however, live on nectar and ripe or rotten fruit. And, when the colonies are at peak population, yellow jackets can be a real nuisance. Walking barefoot among fallen apples is sure to get you stung on the sole. The fast-darting yellow and black females don't like being interrupted when sipping at your picnic watermelon. They will buzz up to hover threateningly right in front of your eyes, and some late-season females will sting repeatedly if they are in a bad mood.
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There is some evidence that mutation or cross-breeding has produced more aggressive yellow jacket varieties of late. Yellow jackets aren't at all an endangered species, so—especially if small kids are running around barefoot—I don't mind killing off a yellow jacket colony at summer's end. The harvest is in, and the wasps have already collected as many caterpillars as they are going to. Other nests will provide plenty of young queens to winter under rocks and in crannies in tree bark, to emerge and start new colonies next spring.
To eliminate a yellow jacket nest, you needn't use poisons. In late afternoon, set a ripe apple or some orange rinds out on the picnic table in the sun and watch the direction the yellow jackets come from and fly toward. Follow the flight path at a safe distance and you'll soon find them entering and leaving the funnel-shaped entrance of an underground or ground-level nest site. Wait till well after dark, then using a flashlight, place a large bowl over the entrance. Be sure the edge is buried in the soil all around. Or, drop a flat rock on the opening and kick soil all around to seal the edge.
Yellow jackets don't have the sense to dig an alternate entrance and the colony will starve to death. If the nest entrance is concealed under a fallen log or inside a stone wall, move the obstructions. If you can't expose the nest quickly enough to get away before they swarm out, resolve to live with them till frost kills off all but the overwintering queens. They won't use the site again.
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