Asian Hornet - Update

[jenkinsbrynmair]

I envisage some disasters for bees when some idiots decide to mix this stuff with honey and leave it out as poison bait for hornets.

 

[mazzamazda]

Do any birds / other wildlife predate on hornets?
If so, won't this get you in trouble with the Wildlife Act?

My chickens eat absolutely everything. They dont eat hornets though. I think the risk has to be very small, these things head full speed towards their nest, hopefully there they drop their guts!

 

[mazzamazda]

I understand but you can do some rudimentary dosing studies to work out the best concentration of fipronil for the syrup and how much you can daub onto the hornet. Perhaps better still, might be that you can use icing sugar to make a slow release paste (a toxic fondant) that you daub onto the back of the hornet. That will slow down the absorption of the dose and also once the hornet gets back to the nest its colleagues will clean it hopefully distributing more of the fipronil throughout the nest.

Will the risk not be higher if it drops off and a bee eats it? The way i'm doing it the only way the poison is going anywhere else is if its eaten, I dont know much that would tackle a hornet.

 

[mazzamazda]

And apparently they now have - I hear a nest has been found high up in a BFO tree

Ahh thats why the NBU have been quiet, they were very open to this idea this morning.

 

[Gilberdyke John]

And apparently they now have - I hear a nest has been found high up in a BFO tree

BFO tree?
That's one I'm not familiar with :-(

 

[JWF]

BFO tree?
That's one I'm not familiar with :-(

It's what they make the shafts for BFO hammers from.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

BFO tree?
That's one I'm not familiar with :-(

It's a maritime term - used to classify sizes of tankers and bulk cargo ships.

as in: VVLCC ( Veryvery large crude carrier) - Big F**K off tanker

 

[mazzamazda]

It's a maritime term - used to classify sizes of tankers and bulk cargo ships.

as in: VVLCC ( Veryvery large crude carrier) - Big F**K off tanker

Yep that must be the nest, they have a talent of picking the biggest, most out of reach, hardest to see through, trees. I was once stood right next to a tree with a nest in and the guy was showing me the nest for about 10 mins and I still couldnt see it. I had my doubts they would find it, well done NBU, hope the queens are still in it.

 

[Beefriendly]

My chickens eat absolutely everything. They dont eat hornets though.

They need training that hornets are food!
The Chinese have been known use their hens/chickens to eat hornets and keep them in their apiaries as "hornet guards". They train the young chickens to eat a diet of hornets by feeding buckets of maize/corn laced with dead hornets. Reduce maize/corn increase dead hornets. So they associate the hornets as food. Remove the maize and leave them in the apiary to deal with the live hornets as their (now) sole source of food.
However, getting sufficient dead hornets to feed them with would seem to the main stumbling block.

 

[Erichalfbee]

And apparently they now have - I hear a nest has been found high up in a BFO tree

I know somebody in the village who does a line in cherry pickers.

 

[user 6228]

I know somebody in the village who does a line in cherry pickers.

R/C drone

 

[Gilberdyke John]

It's a maritime term - used to classify sizes of tankers and bulk cargo ships.

as in: VVLCC ( Veryvery large crude carrier) - Big F**K off tanker

I've learned a little more today

 

[Apiarisnt]

The answer is obvious. Send the hornets into space. It disorients them, shortens their lifetime and disrupts the metamorphoses of the pupae. We have all known this for nearly a quarter of a century: http://www.iami.org.il/projectsEng.htm

 

[Gilberdyke John]

The answer is obvious. Send the hornets into space. It disorients them, shortens their lifetime and disrupts the metamorphoses of the pupae. We have all known this for nearly a quarter of a century: http://www.iami.org.il/projectsEng.htm

A long Lance and spray the nest with a good soaking of petrol or diesel?

 

[Millet]

A long Lance and spray the nest with a good soaking of petrol or diesel?

A shotgun also sounds good with 28 gram 7's in open cylinder.

 

[Erichalfbee]

Anybody noticed this thread has got nearly 3.5K views?
An armed drone sounds neat. Do you think the NBU might have one or would they have to maybe borrow one from Amazon

 

[Pete D]

Pretty sure they will want the nest intact so they can examine it for queen cells

 

[MuswellMetro]

A shotgun also sounds good with 28 gram 7's in open cylinder.

will the queen hornets have left and mated by now?

 

[Millet]

will the queen hornets have left and mated by now?

God knows but i suspect yes, my tongue in cheek quotation was for prior examples in early summer.

 

[Millet]

Pretty sure they will want the nest intact so they can examine it for queen cells

Do they make Queen cells .