Wasp Bane traps

victor meldrew said:

To save all the mashing and mixing , simply buy a large bottle of cheapo bog standard super market prune juice, it works just fine .
You can always sweeten it a little .
Also handy to have if you're a little sluggish

John Wilkinson

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I suppose you have to strain out the wasps first!

Lois said:

I suppose you have to strain out the wasps first!

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No leave em' be .
Helps with the acceleration towards the loo !!

John Wilkinson

Don't forget that it's more important to catch all wasps that enter a trap than to have all wasps enter (and some escape).
If a wasp goes in and can get out, it will signal its mates to join it.

I have tried the pop bottles and caught no wasps, just hoverflies.

The rat glue is working well.
1 trap has caught 25 in one day
I watched the first one land within seconds of putting the trap on one hive. I must admit I felt mean watching its death throes so I popped home and had a beer

Where do I get rat glue, is it safe for bees?

Never seen any, will it catch rats?

I'm removing a wasp nest tomorrow, its about the size of a medicine ball in a cammelia.

I've never seen one in a tree before.

safe for bees.
take a look here
http://www.beekeepingforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=6165&highlight=rat+glue
take the time to go through the whole thread.
It does catch rats.......hence the name....... but baiting it with a dollop of jam and putting on top of a beehive is more likely to catch wasps.

Erichalfbee said:

safe for bees.
take a look here
http://www.beekeepingforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=6165&highlight=rat+glue
take the time to go through the whole thread.
It does catch rats.......hence the name....... but baiting it with a dollop of jam and putting on top of a beehive is more likely to catch wasps.

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One word of warning though, the dollop of jam will also attract wasps, therefore I'd suggest thinking carefully about where you site the trap and for how long

I have wondered about this. What is more attractive to a wasp, a dollop of jam or a whole hive smelling of honey? When I'm bee watching I've noticed that wasps first turn their attention to the hive entrance. When rebuffed they circle the hive for another look and find the jam and hey presto. I've never seen a wasp head straight for the jam.

Erichalfbee said:

I have wondered about this. What is more attractive to a wasp, a dollop of jam or a whole hive smelling of honey?

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Quite sure they prefer the honey, however I'm guessing that a dollop of jam in the open attracts more initial interest than a hive of honey.

Hi,

I hope you don't mind me joining your forum. I am happy to excuse myself if my intrusion causes offence. I'm a pharmacist by profession and I've dedicated my professional life to helping people. Through serendipity I became a co-inventor of the WaspBane wasp trap and along the way I've picked up a great deal of knowledge on the behaviour of wasps so much so that I've been accredited by the British Pest Control Association to provide training for pest controllers. I would be delighted to share my knowledge with you if it helps.

Kind regards,

Karol

Hello Karol,
I've seen the vid on the waspvane it's been around a number of years now .
Sort of Rolls Royce but I rely on the Ford Pop type .
Best of luck, beekeepers are a mean bunch in general

VM

I tried it out last year and as said here, it is no more effective than a good home made one.
I use an old 4 litre plastic water bottle with a hole through each side which I put an old metal tube with wasp size holes drilled through. The wasps enter through the tube and down through the holes but can't exit.(cap screwed on top!) I bait the trap with jam et al and add a bit of yeast for good effect. Only hung one up yesterday and there were several wasps in already. Will have to put up a second as it looks like this year is has been a good one for queeen wasps/.....

First of all, thank you for not throwing me off the forum.

I suspect some of you may cry blasphemy when I say that wasps are an incredibly important insect and we (humans) probably rely on them far more than we appreciate. So WaspBane's approach is about 'managing' wasps rather than just eradicating them.

I'm quite happy to concede that home made jam jar traps, wasp pots and pop bottle traps will kill infinitely more wasps than WaspBane. However, our experience/evidence shows that such low efficiency traps increase the background population of wasps in the vicinity of the traps.

The most important thing to understand is that wasps swarm feed which is a defensive trait predicated on natural competition between wasp colonies. Essentially, wasp colonies send out scouts which, once they find food, communicate that food source to their nest to recruit fellow wasps to fight off wasps from other colonies. If a trap fails to kill the first scouting wasp then the wasp trap itself becomes the problem. The majority of wasp pots and jam jar traps are only about 10 - 20% efficient (i.e. only kill about 10 - 20%) of the scouts they catch. This explains Crazy Bull's posting (at least I think it was Crazy Bull's posting) that he killed thousands of wasps but still attracted 10,000's wasps.

The secret to a good (high efficiency) wasp trap is that it doesn't actually have to kill many wasps (which explains why WaspBane kills comparatively few wasps). Our experience with bee keeping is that it's about reducing numbers of wasps around hives to such a point that they are unable to mount an effective attack.

Happy to contribute more if you would like. The next installment if you're interested is about programmed feeding & navigation.

Best wishes,

Karol

karol,

Please continue .. It's getting interesting..!

I have been efficiently trapping wasps for years . however I site my traps away from the apiary as experience has taught me that traps within the apiary do indeed attract wasps to it !
Although wasps follow a scent trail , they will take advantage of alternative 'forage' close by!

I fully understand the usefulness of wasps both regarding pollination and their role in pest reduction !

Carry on with our enlightenment of the world of wasps .
Whilst defending our colonies (usually in Autumn when the wasp colonies have ceased their brood cycle and become cannibalistic and hungry for sugar) we are mindful of what we are doing !.
By then it is hoped that the newly mated queens are spared but the remainder of the colonies are merely buying time at the expense of our beloved bees

VM

I have a waspbane trap. Last year it caught lots of flies and a few moths. New bait chamber this year, flies only. (And there are plendy of wasps around; I've had to put in entrance reducers to keep them out of hives.) So fed up with it, I added some rotten apple and vinegar to the mix and have just seen the first wasp inside. Unless you can give me some advice, Karol, I'll be back on the side of the cheap bottle brigade.

Sorry to be a kill-joy but I have to say, in the interests of fairness, is this not just a sales pitch?
Sorry Karol, I mean no offence to you, but surely the advertising rules should apply to all?

greatbritishhoney said:

Sorry to be a kill-joy but I have to say, in the interests of fairness, is this not just a sales pitch?
Sorry Karol, I mean no offence to you, but surely the advertising rules should apply to all?

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No web site quoted, no contact details, no price lists !
So far no advertising

VM
PS Admin will act when HE feels the necessity

victor meldrew said:

No web site quoted, no contact details, no price lists !
So far no advertising

VM
PS Admin will act when HE feels the necessity

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Forum rules...
"There is a difference if you are asked about a product and reply because you have used it and either like it or don't "compared to" bragging about how wonderful a product is and then we find out you work for the company who makes or sells it. Just use common sense here, your endorsement of such a product is advertising and again advertising is NOT allowed".

Same rules for everyone?

I'm not getting into any arguments about the running of this forum!
Mark is the ultimate authority .
Plastic policemen faze me not

VM