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Stinging Insects: Hornets

 

Stinging Insects: Yellow Jackets

Why Wasps Come Into Your House

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Stinging Insects and Protecting Your Family

As a last resort, call us to handle the professional removal of bees.

This is delicate and precarious work, don’t try to do it yourself.

There are two main types of hornets in the US, theEuropean and bald-faced hornets. However, the bald-faced hornet is more closely related to yellow jackets than to hornets.

The European hornet makes its nest in secluded areas like hollow trees, inside wall voids, porches and attics. The bald-faced hornet builds round gray paper-like nests on thick bushes, in tree hollows, and on tree branches.

While hornets actually help control populations of other insects, when they build nests inside your home or near it, it can be very dangerous.

 

Love them for their honey but not when they buildcolonies between walls in your house or outbuilding. Not only can honey bees cause health problems, they present a serious problem to the structure of the building.

Honey bees are often mistaken for wasps so it’s important to properly identify the insect for effective removal. If you have a beehive, it must be removed to eliminate the bee colony.

However, Augusta Exterminating recommends that you first call a beekeeper, if possible, to move the bees to another property.
 

Yellow Jacket Control

There are 10 species of wasps:

• Paper Wasp
• Eastern Cicada Killer Wasp
  
• Ground Wasp
  
• European Paper Wasp
  
• Great Black Wasp
  
• Wood Wasp
  
• Mud Dauber Wasp
  
• Sawflies
  
• Spider Wasp
  
• Mud Dauber Wasp
  

Treating stinging insects requires additional caution. Augusta Exterminating has strict guidelines we follow to keep your family and pets safe from possible bee attacks.

We also use pest control solutions that are pet and children friendly.

Call us today and take advantage of our FREE inspection and FREE treatment plan. 540-886-0004

Stinging Insects: Honey Bees

You’ll find wasp nests under roof eaves, in garden sheds, and behind house shutters. Do not try to remove these nests on your own, especially if it’s late summer. Wasps are much more aggressive at this time of year.

Call Augusta Exterminating. We offer professional wasp nest treatment and removal. We follow strict guidelines for the safe removal of these nests. Additionally, we can arrange to return 2 days later with a follow up wasp treatment.

This is the time that scout wasps come back to the nest to try and rebuild. Augusta Exterminating can re-treat to eliminate all the wasps.

We don’t recommend that you try to treat a wasp nest on your own. Without proper equipment, you could set yourself up for multiple wasp stings.

It’s actually pretty easy. You’ll see the entrance holes in the wood, as well as sawdust on the ground. Carpenter bees also produce a combination of bee excrement and pollen near the entrance, both of which are yellow in color.

You may also see woodpeckers eating the immature carpenter bees. Woodpeckers will also bore holes in the wood trying to get at one of their favorite meals.

 

Like honey bees, carpenter bees are important pollinators. There are two kinds of carpenter bees, large and small. Both resemble bumblebees except that their abdomens are shiny.

Large carpenter bees feed on nectar and pollen but dig out wooden objects such as untreated poles, fences, wooden lawn furniture, decks, roof eaves, and window sills to lay their eggs. They prefer dry, unpainted wood like pine, cypress, fir, redwood, and oak.

Carpenter bees love oak split rail fences. However, large carpenter bees will occasionally bore into painted wood, but only if the paint is old and weathered. The female will dig holes in the wood to lay her eggs.

Small carpenter bees will dig holes in twigs and stems to build nests.

Call us today and take advantage of our FREE inspection and FREE treatment plan.

540-886-0004

Call us today and take advantage of our FREE inspection and FREE treatment plan.

540-886-0004

Call us today and take advantage of our FREE inspection and FREE treatment plan. 540-886-0004

How To Get Rid Of Carpenter Bees

Stinging Insects: Carpenter Bees

Parasitic wasps will lay their eggs in the living bodies of caterpillars, spiders, and the like. While the host is still alive, the larvae feed on it.

There are wasps that are beneficial in pest management, especially in agriculture. And many wasps are pollinators, feeding on flower nectar.

But there are aggressive species of wasps that will sting when threatened. Unlike the honey bee that can only sting once, wasps can sting over and over again.

How To Get Rid of Hornets

How To Identify Carpenter Bee Infestations

If you see worker yellow jackets buzzing around, you most likely have an infestation.

Aerial nests are another sign of a yellow jacket infestation.

Bees, hornets, wasps, yellow jackets, mud daubers,bumblebees...the list goes on and on. No, they weren’t put here to torment you, though it does seem like it sometimes!

Stinging insects have a crucial role to play in maintaining the ecosystem in which we live. But, when they encroach on your home, then it’s time to make some corrective balances of your own.

Whether it’s stinging insects that live in the ground, that nest in the ground, or prefer aerial nests, Augusta Exterminating can quickly and effectively treat for these pests.

Here are a few of the most common stinging insects we see in the Staunton, Waynesboro, Churchville areas. 

 

Signs of Wasp Infestation

Sometimes wasp get into your house by accident. But usually, they are looking for:

• A place to nest
• Food
  
• A place to hibernate
  

If wasps build a nest inside your home, the result will most likely be an infestation. Not only should you be concerned about getting stung repeatedly, and subsequent allergic reactions, wasps can damage your ceilings and wallboards.

And, of course, there are scavenger insects that may enter your home and infest abandoned wasp nests.

If wasps winter over in your house, you may not even see them until spring when they head outside to start a new nest.

Central to effective hornet treatment is treating the nest. Knowing which kind of hornet you’re dealing with is key to eliminating them. European hornets prefer to nest in open portions of attics and in wall voids.

The bald-faced hornet prefers constructing aerial nests in large bushes or trees. Unless you have experience eliminating hornets, it’s really best to call the pros at Augusta Exterminating. We can safely and effectively get rid of hornets.

In general, the wasp species is either social or solitary. Social wasps live in colonies, and their numbers can reach in the thousands. Solitary wasps, as the name implies, live alone. They do lay eggs but they leave the eggs to hatch alone.

Some wasps are parasitic and some are predatory. Predatory wasps will kill and eat other insects and animals, feeding their kill to their larvae.

Signs of A Yellow Jacket Infestation

Stinging insects pest control, Staunton, VA

Call us today and take advantage of our FREE inspection and FREE treatment plan. 540-886-0004

While yellow jackets are pollinators and eat flies, beetle grubs, and other harmful pests, they are also scavengers. They like to eat fish, meat, and sugary substances, which makes them a nuisance around garbage cans and at picnics.

Most yellow jackets make nests in the ground. You’ll find their colonies under steps or porches, at the base of trees, along railroad tracks, and in sidewalks. The queen will sometimes use the space between walls to build her nest.

There are also yellow jackets that build aerial nests in the corners of buildings, low-hanging tree branches or in bushes.

Stinging Insects: Wasps

Yellow jackets are natural predators to many damaging insects, which makes them a beneficial insect. That’s why a yellow jacket treatment should only be considered when they pose a threat to you, your family and your pets.

If yellow jackets need to be removed, it’s really best to call us. These bees can be quite aggressive if their nest is disturbed, and their stings are painful.

Augusta Exterminating will make an inspection, locate the nest, and determine the most effective pest control treatment to help eliminate or control yellow jackets.

stinging insects Staunton

Here are three of the most common ways to eliminate carpenter bees:

• Sevin dust and boric acid are effective
• Spray the burrows with a pesticide
  
• Set up a boombox and turn up the volume. Carpenter bees hate loud noises.
  

Finally, if none of these methods work, call Augusta Exterminating. Eliminating stinging insects like carpenter bees is no small task. Sometimes it’s best to let the pros do it!

Call Augusta Exterminating today.

We guarantee our work!

540-886-0004

540-886-0004