YIKES !!!!! Should have taken a selfie with it Paul ha ha.
Great idea to use it as a deterrent though....can't wait to find out if
it works :-)
Seriously though that looks a fearsome football. What were you using to
cut the ivy back ? Nothing mechanical I imagine? You were perhaps lucky
you didn't damage the nest or it might have been a different story!!! A
friend of mine was attacked by wasps a couple of years ago when he was
mowing the grass around Oakley allotments. It's a serious story really
because he was quite badly stung but he had us all in stitches retelling
the tale...complete with actions ha ha... Apparently he was trundling
around on his sit and ride mower cutting the grass when he ran over a
wasps nest !!! Stupidly he knew the nest was there in the ground but
had totally forgotten about it on the day and mowed straight over it !!!
and they went ballistic !!! He said they'd chased him all around the
plot and he ended up having to hide in his Rotavator cupboard (which was
only about 1 metre high) lol. And in his haste to run away he'd left
the mower running but then when he emerged from his bunker he couldn't
get near enough to it to shut the engine down !!! In the end he just
left it to run out of fuel ha ha.
Anyway, glad you got away with your encounter Paul and glad too your
wasps are ignoring your bees :)
Ann
On 19/09/2019 22:20, Oxnatbees wrote:
Last week I was cutting ivy off the side of our house, and I uncovered a wasp nest the size of my head about 8 feet above ground level. (See photo)
oo er um. Wasn't expecting to come face to face with this. I am up a ladder. Brace for mad attack...
Actually only about 3 wasps came out. I froze, because I assume like bees they see mainly movement. They ignored me. This has been my experience before - wasps do not seem to deserve their fearsome reputation as aggressors.
I don't intend doing anything about it. Wasps are useful in the garden (eat caterpillers, aphids etc) and, now the weak colony has died, my other hives are not under attack, even though they are just 20m away. Wasps are territorial and this nest is probably more useful alive, driving away other wasps. They will die out at the end of the year. If a hive comes under attack, then I can destroy it.
Lynne had a great idea. In winter, when it is properly dead, cut it down and reattach it to the apple tree near the hives. It may deter other wasps from founding nests in our garden!
Also attached: a cute picture I took a few years ago, but lost for ages.
Paul
