[HN Gopher] Wasp Blower
___________________________________________________________________
Wasp Blower
Author : bookofjoe
Score : 88 points
Date : 2025-10-13 10:29 UTC (11 days ago)
(HTM) web link (softsolder.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (softsolder.com)
| stanac wrote:
| Reminds me of something similar I saw a few days ago.
|
| https://old.reddit.com/r/3Dprinting/comments/1o195z6/i_elimi...
| xattt wrote:
| I had a wasp problem last year where they were going into the
| attic of my home. I did what I could with spray cans, but it
| wasn't enough.
|
| I ended up calling an exterminator who used delta dust, which the
| wasps carry into the nest. It was a little pricey (~$150) but it
| was peace of mind from the other alternative, being able to do
| nothing. The exterminator came back for free a few days later to
| re-dust when there was little change in activity. The second go
| did the trick.
|
| I did look at a few options online before calling. One idea was
| to set up a vacuum trap with a shop vac (1).
|
| (1) https://woodgears.ca/misc/wasp_sucker.html
| taneq wrote:
| I feel like this is more of a wasp sucker. Or even a wasp
| processor (in the same vein as 'food processor').
| sumo89 wrote:
| More like "Wasp Wood Chipper"
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| This summer, we had a white-faced hornet nest, in a bush, a few
| feet from our front door, so it had to go.
|
| Normally, hornets are great. They are _nowhere near_ as
| aggressive as yellowjackets (unless you mess with the nest), and
| they eat yellowjackets, so you either have hornets or
| yellowjackets, but not both (but they also eat bees, so people
| who want to encourage pollinators, need to discourage them).
|
| But that low on the ground, and that close to the house, they had
| to go.
|
| I have heard too many horror stories about botched hornet
| removal, so I called in a pro. I have a friend in the business,
| so I got a break (but that was $150).
|
| It was interesting, watching him do it. Took about 15 minutes. He
| had a special suit. It looked flimsy, but they couldn't get
| through.
| Tepix wrote:
| Why didn't he just move it to another place? Hornets are a
| threatened species.
| the_sleaze_ wrote:
| Which hornets are threatened?
|
| The only hornets news I hear is that they're invasive and
| killing pollinators.
| hocuspocus wrote:
| European hornets are protected in several European
| countries. The low population is also a reason we have too
| many wasps.
|
| That said even though they're not particularly aggressive,
| I don't know anyone who would just leave a nest on their
| property.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| I think that some southern US households like to
| encourage them, as long as they aren't in an area where
| humans can disturb them.
|
| They kill all kinds of nasty bugs, and are pretty
| standoffish (as long as you don't get near the nest).
|
| Piss them off, however, and your life will experience
| whole new vistas of pain.
| hocuspocus wrote:
| Right, by European standards even if you live in a
| detached house with a backyard, any location is probably
| going to be too close, as you probably don't want to be
| bothered when you eat outside or have people over for a
| barbecue.
|
| Obviously if you live on a farm, it might be different,
| especially if you have fruit trees, which should keep
| them busy.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| Around here, they usually set up, high in a tree. You
| often can't see the nest, until fall.
|
| Yellowjackets, on the other hand, dig holes; often quite
| near houses. They are also quite aggressive. You can
| easily disturb their nests.
|
| Also, I don't think hornet stings are as venomous as
| yellowjacket stings (they probably don't need to be).
| Being swarmed by yellowjackets _really_ sucks.
|
| I'd pick hornets over yellowjackets, any day.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| Not white-faced hornets[0]. They are _everywhere_ on the East
| Coast USA.
|
| They aren't actually real hornets. They are just big
| yellowjackets.
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolichovespula_maculata
| jonbiggums22 wrote:
| I have good luck with low nests just buying a can of wasp spray
| (the ones that foam and have a claimed 30ft range, although
| somewhat less in practice) and soaking down the nest at dust. I
| usually put on some extra clothing and make a run for it but I
| haven't been chased. The can only cost like $15.
|
| What I don't have good luck with is the nests built high up
| since I'm afraid of heights
| comrade1234 wrote:
| I was at my cabin in the fall - it was after Covid and the first
| time I was there in a couple of years. I got a nice fire going in
| the fireplace and maybe thirty minutes later I saw a wasp flying
| very poorly and slowly around the living room. Then a few more
| and a few more. I figure they must have built a nest in the attic
| during Covid, and were in hibernation for the winter but the
| warmth woke them up.
|
| So that night and the next few I had a roaring fire and let it
| get cold during the day. I really didn't want to go into the
| attic to investigate. Eventually there were no more wasps.
| Problem solved!
| LtdJorge wrote:
| For people that don't know, regular wasps always leave in the
| face of danger to the nest. If you have the typical small nest,
| the easiest thing you can do is hit it fast with a broom or
| similar. They will all disappear in seconds.
|
| I've seen my dad do it a lot of times with his bare hands, never
| got stung. But if you pass by the nest enough times, you'll be.
|
| Another good solution is fire. A blow torch with a wide flame,
| burns their wings (if it doesn't outright kill them) and also
| their nest, which is more or less made of paper.
| comrade1234 wrote:
| lol. I had a neighbor burn his shed down that way. The fun (not
| sarcastic) of rural life.
| LtdJorge wrote:
| Well, yeah. You have to be careful. Here, houses are made of
| brick, and almost no one has a shed, YMMV.
| IncreasePosts wrote:
| Sorry, but no one has a shed? Where do you cook your meth?
| Please don't tell me the house.
| tmerc wrote:
| Alternatively, if you like having your house not catch on
| fire...
|
| Soapy water is unreasonably effective. Water alone is not. The
| soap makes the water extra clingy and does a pretty rapid job
| of incapacitating insects. Then killing them. I've taken out
| individual wasps this way, but not a whole nest.
| jonbiggums22 wrote:
| I once saw a video of a crazy dude take care of a wasp nest by
| putting a plastic grocery bag over it and detaching the nest in
| one smooth motion, then tying it shut and throwing it in the
| trash. He didn't get stung because the nest was tied up before
| the wasps even knew they were under attack.
| FeteCommuniste wrote:
| Some people get even crazier:
| https://www.youtube.com/shorts/QAe7gtkp_2E
| akarlsten wrote:
| We had a wasps nest last summer inside the wall under the eaves
| of our house, some kid from the exterminator's came with a long
| telescoping rod and puffed some kind of white powder into the
| opening. He explained that it was something like a slow-acting
| poison (or maybe like diatomaceous earth) that would cover the
| drones when they left or arrived at the nest and that it was
| enough for one of these drones to brush up against the queen to
| kill her. They swarmed around for a few hours then we never saw
| them again, so it apparently worked.
|
| This was after attempting to spray the opening with regular wasp
| spray a few times. Sure, it killed a dozen or so drones each time
| but never really put a dent in the population.
| exasperaited wrote:
| A good spray picking off the very earliest dozen or so wasps in
| the early spring may actually directly get the queen, who has
| not always permanently settled in. That point or the next few
| weeks is an excellent opportunity to add secondary toxins that
| the workers will carry in, because the nest is so small they
| will encounter the queen.
|
| Beyond that I guess only completely saturating an internal
| trunk route through the thing with a tool like that is going to
| work!
| exasperaited wrote:
| Vigilance and attentiveness is definitely better here; early in
| the year you are looking for a handful of wasps spending more
| time near any one part of the facade of your house than normal.
| Pick a warm day in mid-spring, go round the property and note
| where wasps are going.
|
| You can safely use a spray to pick them off late in the evening,
| and if you get there early enough, depending on the species, one
| of those wasps could actually be the queen, because she may still
| be leaving the nest in order to care for her earliest brood.
|
| If you don't get the queen, because the nest is so small, you may
| get enough toxin onto one of the early workers that they will
| bring it into contact with the queen.
|
| You then use an insecticide foam around the entrance to any hole
| you see wasps going into. You can lay it on pretty thick, more
| than once, and they will progressively poison the nest. You can
| do this a few days apart in the evening.
|
| Since the nest is still small you probably don't need to hit the
| nest, and you might as well leave it because then no other colony
| will use the space. You do need to saturate any pathway they take
| to it.
|
| Directly above a bedroom window that is impossible to see from
| the outside but can be deduced by a process of elimination, in
| the roof of my 210 year old house, is a tiny gap, which attracted
| a nest nine years ago. I used this method and while I think I
| might very well have got the queen directtly, activity around the
| nest stopped in about 48 hours, and while every year I see wasps
| investigate the hole, I am guessing corpses put them off.
|
| In the warm late spring of the pandemic I resprayed the hole, and
| sprayed a couple more, with what was left of the can, because I
| reasoned that it might be difficult to get a pest controller to
| deal with them; this proved to be a wise decision because nests
| established in several places nearby in that lovely hot summer
| that went untreated for far too long.
| jonbiggums22 wrote:
| This is good advice but I find they can build a nest quite fast
| once they get going. I've found a golf ball sized nest built
| onto the inside of a garage door that I'd only opened that
| morning.
| javier_e06 wrote:
| I wish I had the was blower 3 months ago. Wasps nested in the
| space between my laundry room and the 2nd floor. The exit was a
| crack between the concrete blocks outside wall and the vinyl
| siding. They found an entrance into the house through the
| overhead light socket when a fool whose name shall not be
| mentioned duck-taped their regular exit route. A call to the
| pest-control and $400.00 USD later took care of it. They bore a
| tiny hole next to the exit and pumped lethal gas in it. The
| problem with the was blower in my case it it would have to be 8
| ft attached to the wall.
| itintheory wrote:
| I had two yellowjacket nests in the wood siding of my house this
| summer. Several cans of foaming spray had no effect since it
| couldn't penetrate far enough inside. I found a random forum
| thread where someone suggested using Sevin insecticide powder on
| the openings. It took a week and a half of daily applications
| using a paintbrush, but it seemed to be effective. Less expensive
| than calling an exterminator, and I have most of the can of
| powder left for next time.
| taneq wrote:
| Pro tip if you're trying to deal with any of these: Do it while
| it's _cold_. Do not (as I did the first time) gird your
| appendages in towels and other random shielding, then do it in
| the mid-afternoon when it 's been warm for hours and they're
| prepped to go like fighter jets with warmed up engines. Get up
| first thing in the morning when it's crispy and you can just
| get a can of bug spray and coat each one as it comes out.
| Ethical? No. Effective? Yes. I believe those two might be at
| odds.
| goda90 wrote:
| I do it at night. They sleep, and using a red headlamp I
| don't think I disturbed them too much. After I saw activity
| drop off, I used expanding foam to seal the hole.
| hagbard_c wrote:
| I tend to use a shop vacuum to get rid of undesirable wasp nests.
| Fill the tank with a few litres of water so the victims have
| something to drown in, point the tube at the nest entry or
| whatever entry the wasps use and switch it on for an hour or so.
| As soon as there is some disturbance most of the resident wasps
| will exit the nest to defend it so you'll get the resident
| population in only a few minutes. Keep the vacuum in place for a
| while to catch those which were out and about. Once you've got
| (most of) the workers the nest will die out if left alone. If you
| can reach it you can knock it down and drown or burn it, if it is
| in a wall somewhere that is not an option.
|
| Don't forget to put water in the tank or you'll be met by a cloud
| of angry wasps when you open it.
| jagged-chisel wrote:
| If you forget the water at first, you can always vacuum it in
| later
| foobarian wrote:
| I just waited a week.
| squeedles wrote:
| I do this as well, but put in about an inch of water with a few
| drops of dish soap. Instant wasp kryptonite. I have a few
| extension tubes so I can just lean it up against the house and
| watch as they are sucked in coming in or out.
|
| It is absolutely hypnotizing.
|
| It won't kill an entire nest late in the season, but will knock
| down their numbers so that they aren't as prevalent.
| tmerc wrote:
| You _can_ kill the nest this late in the season with a
| vacuum. I just did it 2-3 weeks ago; got the queen and all.
| It took several weeks of vacuum of intermittent vacuuming but
| you can. I've done this twice using the same method.
| xpe wrote:
| Unrelated to wasp eradication, but interesting, still:
|
| Three Valuable Peptides from Bee and Wasp Venoms for Therapeutic
| and Biotechnological Use: Melittin, Apamin and Mastoparan [1]
|
| BBC: Wasp venom 'a weapon against cancer' (2015) [2]
|
| [1]: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8000949/
|
| [2]: https://www.bbc.com/news/health-34115112
| foobarian wrote:
| Similar story, had a nest in the walls of a bay window bump. Too
| far up the side to spray effectively, but they had one weakness:
| there was a clear entrance spot. So I duct taped a pool vacuum
| hose next to it and ran it into the garage attached to a shop
| vac. Left it running for a day, problem solved. It was fun
| listening to the "ka-thunk" sound when each insect got sucked in.
| I think for next time I'll make some kind of detector based on
| audio to count the kills.
| blincoln wrote:
| I've used a shop vac as a first step, but if it's the only
| step, won't the queen survive and make more wasps? Unless you
| left it running for so long the queen starved to death, I mean.
|
| My current approach is to wait until after dark, then fill up
| the nest entrance with spray foam (while wearing a beekeeper
| suit, just to be safe). I don't think that would work for
| walls, though - they'd probably find another way out.
| bigstrat2003 wrote:
| In fact, that approach is explicitly warned against for
| walls. When they can't get out their former entrance, they
| will start to chew through the wall to make a new one - and
| there's no guarantee that new entrance will lead to the
| outside, rather than your living room.
| foobarian wrote:
| My problem was the nest was hard to reach, and I was afraid
| that even if spraying did manage to kill the wasps, I would
| be left with a gross wet decomposing mass in the wall
| causing rot and water damage. I still need to figure out
| how to remove the existing nest but I'll wait until it's
| vacant :-)
| tmerc wrote:
| My first time having yellow jackets in my wall, I sprayed
| poison in the entrance. They found a new way to leave the
| nest that was into my kitchen. That's when I stopped using
| poison.
| samcheng wrote:
| I've needed two passes in the past, a few days apart. One to
| catch all of the adults, and another to catch any new wasps
| that emerged immediately after the first pass.
| IncreasePosts wrote:
| I used the shop vac method as well, occasionally shooting near
| their (hidden in a retaining wall) nest with a hose to piss
| them off and make them come out and get sucked up. I couldn't
| believe in the end there were two gallons of yellow jackets I
| captured.
| I_dream_of_Geni wrote:
| Haha! We did the same thing! And we caught about 2 gallons of
| yellow jackets too. We let it run for about 10 hours (it gets
| them coming or going), and then when we took down the vac, I
| let it run and sprayed wasp spray to make sure they were
| dead. I freaked out when I opened it, seeing the shop vac was
| half full!!!!
| samcheng wrote:
| This is the technique I have used, too! You can put soapy water
| in the shop vac.
|
| This avoids spraying poisons around your household environment.
| alexjplant wrote:
| Years ago one of my friends left a half-drank can of beer
| outside of my house on a hot summer night. I found it a few
| days later when I went to take the mower out of the shed. To my
| surprise when I picked it up I felt something rattling around
| inside. In the interceding period a bunch of wasps had
| apparently decided to help themselves to my buddy's leftover
| National Bohemian and ended up drowning in what I assume to be
| intoxicated bliss.
|
| Or maybe they couldn't find their way out of the can in the
| dark, who knows. As a fellow Boh aficionado I can't blame them
| for trying.
| f1shy wrote:
| Related video from M Wandel:
| https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OM4Nku2qAiI&pp=ygUVTWF0dGhpYXM...
| falcor84 wrote:
| I was more impressed when Emily the Engineer built an actual Wasp
| Launcher - https://youtu.be/mEn2kA0cAGw
| Skwid wrote:
| I see a lot of advice being given in these comments, and I find
| it a little alarming that my own preference hasn't got a mention.
| Just leave them be? I've had plenty of wasp nests in sheds, roof
| spaces, garages etc and never had a problem peacefully coexisting
| with them. Almost everyone I've spoken to about it shares this
| sentiment, and generally wouldn't do anything about it unless it
| was in an especially risky location.
|
| I get the impression most commenters here are from the US, whilst
| I live in the UK. Am I naive to the aggression of American wasps,
| or is it just more acceptable to kill creatures you find
| bothersome over there?
|
| Does anyone with experience both sides of the pond have any
| insight?
| unwind wrote:
| If you have (young) kids, having active/plentiful wasps nearby
| might just not work. Wasps can be scary, especially to children
| who have been stung before, and they are super-impractical
| around kids eating/snacking, too. "Close your mouth and relax"
| just doesn't _get through_ to a scared kid, in my experience.
| :|
| oidar wrote:
| > Am I naive to the aggression of American wasps
|
| Yes. Yellow jackets are very aggressive. Having them live in or
| next to your house is just asking for an injury.
| blincoln wrote:
| Maybe you have friendlier wasps in the UK, but the common ones
| in the US (yellowjackets, mud daubers, etc.) are generally very
| aggressive, and trying to coexist with them will end badly
| sooner or later.
|
| I'm vegetarian because of personal ethics. I safely capture and
| release spiders I find in the house. I use live traps for mice
| and rats, and release them in the woods. But most wasps here
| are on my "nip the problem in the bud" list, along with
| termites, Scotch Broom, and a few other things.
|
| I leave non-aggressive wasps, like Great Golden Diggers, alone.
| knappa wrote:
| I don't know, but I've never had trouble with mud daubers.
| tmerc wrote:
| In my experience (and wikipedia), mud daubers aren't
| aggressive. You may have misidentified a species or had an
| uncommon experience. They prey on spiders so I consider them
| beneficial. Only real issue with them is that they clog up
| mechanisms with mud.
| pavel_lishin wrote:
| What's wrong with Scotch Broom? It looks lovely, and I was
| thinking of planting some.
| chihuahua wrote:
| It's invasive.
|
| From Wikipedia:
|
| In North America, Scotch broom was frequently planted in
| gardens, and was later used for erosion control along
| highway cuts and fills. Scotch broom is slightly toxic and
| unpalatable to livestock, and its seeds are viable for up
| to ten years, allowing them to regrow many years later,
| after extermination of the plant.
| unregistereddev wrote:
| Part of the difference might be our obsession with sugary foods
| and drink. There are several different kinds of wasps here.
| Paper wasps and mud daubers are not all that aggressive and you
| can ignore them, unless you have a sugary drink outside. Then
| they will fly unnoticed into your soda can and you have a
| surprise next time you take a sip. If you stay calm and spit
| out the wasp quickly enough, they probably won't sting you. If
| you panic (like kids tend to do), they will sting the inside of
| your mouth.
|
| The other part might come from having different types of wasps.
| The ones in the article look like yellowjackets, which are
| extremely aggressive. They also tend to nest in holes in the
| ground. Yellowjackets are bad news because if you accidentally
| step close to their nest they will swarm you, often getting
| multiple stings in even if you are quick to run away.
| ssharp wrote:
| Where I live, bald-faced hornets and yellowjackets are very
| aggressive. Yellowjackets will also build nests inside of
| structures, in the ground, etc. where it's sometimes very
| difficult to even know they are there until it's too late.
|
| This is much different than honey bees and other types of wasps
| who are much less likely to attack just by being near them.
| anhner wrote:
| European here, more than once I have been stuck by a yellow
| jacket for the simple crime of staying outside, minding my own
| business. My father was very badly stung because he
| accidentally disturbed a (hidden) nest. So I hate them with a
| passion. They also kill honeybees if you want another reason.
| tmerc wrote:
| No experience in the uk, but I might be able to explain.
| YellowJackets are wasps, I'm calling them out specifically;
| wasp is used for other species.
|
| Wasps nest under the eaves of houses all the time. If they're
| not near an entryway, usually people leave them alone as long
| as the nest stays small.
|
| Yellow jackets do not nest under the eaves of a house. They
| burrow in the ground (or walls) where you can't see them or the
| nest size. They're also particularly aggressive and will swarm
| if you step on their nest.
|
| YJs are more aggressive and territorial than a normal "wasp"
| with the added bonus of sometimes they just swarm you out of
| nowhere.
| IncreasePosts wrote:
| The wasp nest from ops article was inside of their front door
| jamb. Basically anyone visiting the front door during daylight
| hours would be attacked by a swarm of wasps that thought their
| nest was being disturbed.
| Vipsy wrote:
| It's amazing how much DIY problem-solving comes out of necessity.
| Always interesting to see the basic household tech getting
| repurposed in a creative ways.
| debo_ wrote:
| Horror. The spiral birth factory, stepped terraces of the
| hatching cells, blind jaws of the unborn moving ceaselessly, the
| staged progress from egg to larva, near-wasp, wasp. In his mind's
| eye, a kind of time-lapse photography took place, revealing the
| thing as the biological equivalent of a machine gun, hideous in
| its perfection.
| aaronbrethorst wrote:
| _Neuromancer_ , in case anyone's curious.
| https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7235994-horror-the-spiral-b...
|
| Great book.
| ravedave5 wrote:
| I just vacuumed up a bee hive that had taken residence in my
| siding. Just rigged up my shop vac at the entrance and left it
| on.
| harwoodr wrote:
| Bees or yellowjacket wasps? The first are pretty much "live and
| let live" the second turn into aggressive starving balls of
| winged hate in the late summer and early fall.
|
| Bees make honey and pollinate - yellowjacket wasps may remove
| some pests from the environment, but otherwise bring pain and
| suffering to the unwary.
| tmerc wrote:
| If they have moved into the walls where you live, they need
| to be removed. Species is not important here.
| genuineresponse wrote:
| Wasps in a high traffic area are definitely bad, but if the nest
| is somewhere not too in the way I'd encourage folks to leave it
| be. Wasps are predators, and they eat a lot of the bugs that
| damage gardens. Yes, they are also assholes, do you have to
| strike a balance, but they can be really beneficial.
|
| Obviously, if you've got young kids around or the wasps are being
| aggressive, take care of the humans first, but understanding them
| a bit can really reduce the conflict with them.
| opwieurposiu wrote:
| When we were kids we used to catch wasps in a plastic cup, put
| them in the freezer until they were anesthetized, and then tie
| a little leash on them with sewing thread.
|
| Then you chase your friends around the neighborhood with your
| personal attack wasp. Good times.
| chandureddyvari wrote:
| Slightly tangential but this was a learning moment for me.
|
| This reminds me of a story where Sage Mandavya established
| the first juvenile law in Hindu mythology.
|
| <story starts>
|
| Long ago, there lived a great sage named Mandavya who had
| taken a vow of silence and spent his days in deep meditation.
| One day, while he sat motionless beneath a tree with his arms
| raised in penance, a group of thieves being pursued by the
| king's soldiers fled into his hermitage. They hid their
| stolen loot near the sage and escaped through the other side.
| When the king's soldiers arrived, they found the stolen goods
| but the sage--deep in meditation and bound by his vow of
| silence--neither confirmed nor denied their presence. The
| soldiers arrested him and brought him before the king,
| accusing him of harboring criminals.
|
| Despite his spiritual stature, the king ordered a severe
| punishment: Mandavya was to be impaled on a stake (shula)--a
| horrific execution where a wooden spike was driven through
| the body. However, due to his immense yogic powers and
| detachment from the physical world, the sage did not die. He
| remained alive on the stake, enduring the agony with
| superhuman patience. Eventually, other sages intervened, the
| king realized his grave error, and Mandavya was freed. But
| the damage was done. When the sage finally left his mortal
| body, he went directly to Yamaloka--the realm of Yama, the
| god of death and justice--to demand an explanation.
|
| "Why did I have to suffer such a gruesome fate?" Sage
| Mandavya asked Lord Yama. "What terrible sin did I commit to
| deserve impalement?" Yama consulted his records and replied,
| "When you were a child, you caught a dragonfly and pierced it
| with a needle through its body, watching it suffer for your
| amusement. That act of cruelty resulted in your punishment -
| you experienced the same suffering you inflicted on that
| innocent creature."
|
| Sage Mandavya was furious. "That was when I was a child!" he
| protested. "I was too young to understand the difference
| between right and wrong, between sin and virtue. How can you
| punish an ignorant child with the same severity as a knowing
| adult?"
|
| Yama tried to explain that karma operates impartially, but
| Mandavya would not accept this. In his righteous anger, the
| sage cursed Yama himself: "For this unjust judgment, you
| shall be born as a human on Earth and experience mortality
| yourself!" This curse led to Yama being born as Vidura, the
| wise and virtuous counselor in the Mahabharata - a human who,
| despite his wisdom and righteousness, had to endure the
| limitations and sufferings of mortal life.
|
| But Mandavya didn't stop there. Using his spiritual
| authority, he proclaimed a new divine law: "No sin committed
| by a child below the age of fourteen shall count toward their
| karmic debt equivalent to that of an adult. Children who do
| not yet understand dharma and adharma shall not be punished
| for their ignorant actions." This became the first "juvenile
| law" in Hindu mythology--a recognition that children, in
| their innocence and ignorance, deserve compassion and
| correction rather than severe punishment.
|
| <story ends>
|
| When I was a child, I too wanted to catch a dragonfly and tie
| a thread to it so it would fly around like a little pet. But
| my mother stopped me. She told me this very story of Sage
| Mandavya, and it scared me for life. I never forgot it, and I
| never tried to catch and bind a dragonfly again.
| chihuahua wrote:
| Two thoughts:
|
| 1. If is were possible for an ordinary mortal to impose
| arbitrary curses on the god of death and justice, the world
| would quickly descend into utter chaos.
|
| 2. If children are completely free from accountability,
| adults will form them into an army and convince them to
| commit crimes on their behalf, leading to an intolerable
| situation. This may already be a standard way of doing
| business in some parts of the world.
| neilv wrote:
| > _1. If is were possible for an ordinary mortal to
| impose arbitrary curses on the god of death and justice,
| the world would quickly descend into utter chaos._
|
| Opportunity myth? Mortals are simply temporarily
| embarrassed gods?
| ordu wrote:
| 1. idk how it works in Hindu mythology, but Mandavya
| doesn't look an ordinary mortal for me. Double so: not
| ordinary and not mortal.
|
| 2. It would fail to deliver. The goal is to avoid
| punishment for crimes? But I suspect that convincing
| children to commit crimes is a crime by itself.
| throwuxiytayq wrote:
| > If is were possible for an ordinary mortal to impose
| arbitrary curses
|
| Yes, but _logic_ doesn 't apply to religious beliefs;
| _anime logic_ does.
| skinkestek wrote:
| > If children are completely free from accountability,
| adults will form them into an army and convince them to
| commit crimes on their behalf, leading to an intolerable
| situation. This may already be a standard way of doing
| business in some parts of the world.
|
| This is an ongoing problem in Norway now and I think it
| has been in Sweden for some time.
|
| If you want to read more, search for the foxtrot network.
| Brian_K_White wrote:
| I fried them in a piece of glass tube from a neon sign, with
| the high voltage wires from the transformer poked into the
| opposing ends of the tube until it started to arc from wire
| to wire through the wasp. Stank.
|
| I'm neither proud nor ashamed. Today in my more boring older
| age I just grab whatever random inappropriate houshold or
| automotive chemical is handy that squirts or sprays.
|
| Wish I had thought of the freezer & string thing.
| mgerdts wrote:
| Soapy water (dish soap) in a spray bottle works wonders.
| Once they are wet and bubbly they can't fly, making it safe
| to knock them to the ground and squish them.
|
| If you happen to have the spray bottle in hand while they
| are flying at you, a quick mist in the air in their flight
| path will turn them away.
| doph wrote:
| Very much this. After multiple very painful stings, I have a
| zero tolerance policy for nests on the house, but I am very
| grateful when they show up in the garden. Wasps are more
| effective at controlling garden pests than any chemical means
| I've tried. Plus they seem to be the only pollinators of my
| passionfruit.
| kragen wrote:
| Around here the passion flowers are mostly pollinated by a
| species of bumblebee with an almost-all-black abdomen and
| beautiful violet wings. So far they haven't stung me,
| although I'm sure they could, and it would be very painful. I
| haven't tried capturing them.
| chihuahua wrote:
| It sounds like it could be Xylocopa violacea, the violet
| carpenter bee, found in Europe and Asia:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xylocopa_violacea
| kragen wrote:
| I'm in South America, and it doesn't look very similar:
| http://canonical.org/~kragen/bumblebee.jpeg
|
| I think these are also much larger than the violet
| carpenter bee.
| stronglikedan wrote:
| I used to want to kill them all, regardless of where they were,
| until I watched this excellent SciShow video[0] titled "What If
| We Killed All the Wasps?". (but ticks can still go fuck
| themselves to death)
|
| [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GO5unZIbSFY
| jihadjihad wrote:
| I'm fine with your garden variety paper wasp, along with its
| European counterpart [0] that is all over the US and closely
| resembles a yellow jacket, but the latter tucks its legs in
| flight while the former doesn't, which makes distinguishing the
| two relatively easy. Paper wasps generally aren't aggressive
| unless you're in their business, and they're easy to deal with
| if you have to.
|
| Yellow jackets are a different story entirely. Sometimes they
| nest underground which can be a real problem (mowing/lawncare,
| pets, children), and they are far more aggressive than paper
| wasps and hornets. The sting is quite a bit worse than either,
| too, so my philosophy is if I find a nest in the spring it's
| given no quarter with no remorse.
|
| 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_paper_wasp
| jwally wrote:
| When the crusader army reached Beziers, they demanded that all
| heretics be handed over. The townspeople refused, and the
| crusaders stormed the city. Once inside, they couldn't tell
| Catholics from Cathars--everyone spoke the same language and
| lived side by side.
|
| That's when the Cistercian legate Arnaud Amalric supposedly
| gave his infamous order:
|
| "Caedite eos; Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius." "Kill them
| all; for the Lord knows those that are His."
|
| It's a paraphrase of 2 Timothy 2:19 ("The Lord knoweth them
| that are his").
|
| The crusaders slaughtered virtually the entire population--
| estimated between 10,000 - 20,000 people--before burning the
| city.
|
| ps I have an irrational fear of wasps
| doodlebugging wrote:
| I have lots of paper wasps and red wasps nesting around my house
| and on the inside and outside of several outbuildings. They do a
| great job managing the fly population around here.
|
| If you have a problem with wasps trying to nest under porches at
| your exterior doors you should paint the underside of the porches
| sky blue. This will discourage nesting by making the wasps feel
| like the site is exposed to the weather.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| If you have a nest in the ground you can fill it with CO2 gas at
| the entrance hole in the evening when they are resting. The gas
| will sink into the nest and leave no toxic residue.
|
| Trick might be finding the CO2, you can normally rent a tank at a
| welding supply shop. You'll also need a pressure regulator and
| hose.
|
| Dry ice can also be used, put some in a soda bottle with water
| and a hose taped up or snug fit to the top. Do not allow the
| bottle to pressurize however.
|
| Some people have reported using car exhaust but I'm not sure
| that's as effective.
| move-on-by wrote:
| I haven't seen my successful method mentioned yet, so I'll share.
|
| I had a ground nest, but it was built into a rock wall for a
| raised flower bed. They had several exit points. Despite emptying
| multiple of those spray cans, it was a healthy hive. Feeling
| discouraged, I dumped a bunch of fire ant powder all over the
| rocks. I did it at night, hoping they were all in there. I
| checked on them the next day and they were gone. I have no idea
| if it killed them or they decided it wasn't a good home location
| anymore and left. Either way, no more yellow jackets.
| EvanAnderson wrote:
| The house we bought last year "came with" cicada killer wasps[0].
| They are impressive insects. The ones show in the Wikipedia
| article are a little smaller than the ones we have! I'd never
| heard of these things before getting this house.
|
| They are somewhat destructive in their nesting. We ended up
| having to kill a few when they were excavating the bedding sand
| between the flagstones surrounding the house. They could dig out
| a pile of sand standing 4 - 5 inches tall in about 30 minutes
| (leaving a hole about an inch in diameter right in the middle of
| the pile).
|
| They don't sting and are scared of humans. When they're unladen
| they fly very quickly and are quite agile. When they're laden
| with a cicada they bumble through the air in a most amusing way.
| They are also persistent-as-heck when it comes to their nesting
| behavior.
|
| I wish I could do something like this wasp blower to gently
| suggest these guys nest in the yard instead of between the
| flagstones.
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sphecius_speciosus
| linsomniac wrote:
| I've found if you have wasps nesting somewhere that there is an
| entrance or a sheltered place for them to build their nest, it's
| best to cover or fill the entrance if possible. Caulking or Great
| Stuff foam is a great choice here. Any cracks or holes they use
| to get behind siding or the like, for example. We had persistent
| nest problems in an underhang of our Little Free Library, which
| is a terrible place for a wasp nest, and I filled that gap with
| great stuff.
|
| We have paper wasps predominantly around here, and they will tend
| to nest in secluded areas, often voids or overhangs. I built my
| shed specifically to limit the ability for wasps to have a great
| place to make home.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2025-10-24 23:00 UTC)