Deterring wasps

[Nannysbees]

View attachment 24208

A friend and fellow beek had this wasp problem last summer

 

[Gilberdyke John]

I suffered a lot of wasps at one particular apiary. Any suggestions for the best bait for catching the early queens. I only want to do this at one site where they were a real nuisance, at my other apiaries I will leave the wasps well alone.

Look up combatting wasps in New Zealand

 

[Curly green finger's]

A friend and fellow beek had this wasp problem last summer

That video has made me think a bit.
There is also a lot of colonys in one apiary.
Has he/she decided to move some to an apiary with less problems?

I've been shown pictures and shown videos from friends, but I've never seen a wasp problem like that.
Im also wondering would it not be better to set the traps away from the apiary?
As having traps in an apiary is going to attract them?

 

[Karol]

The danger of using low efficiency traps. They only recruit more wasps to the vicinity. If you look very carefully you will notice wasps escaping these pop bottle traps.

 

[Pembroke]

The danger of using low efficiency traps. They only recruit more wasps to the vicinity. If you look very carefully you will notice wasps escaping these pop bottle traps.

Hi Karol, pop bottles work okay if you do them properly. I use a 2 litre bottle with the smallest amount of 'neck' cut off and reversed that I can get away with so that the entrance and the surface of the fluid are as far apart as possible (further to fly back, and helps if it rains). With approx. 10 cm of trapping liquid in the bottom some sort of sweet liquid beer, juice, or water mixed with jam and sugar (never honey) also a few ml of washing up liquid (which is supposed to kill the surface tension to stop wasps standing on the surface and being able to take off again and a little bit of vinegar which is supposed (no idea if it works) to deter bees and other insects going in.

The big problem these in the video seem to have though is they've been left rather than emptied. I don't know how long the traps have been operating but the advantage of pop bottle traps is you can make the top part easily removable so can clean them out frequently.

 

[Karol]

Disrupting surface tension works for a while but wasps float when then drown creating a raft which will prevent other wasps from drowing. Increasing the height will improve efficiency but not enough in my experience to make the traps safe to use.

One of the dangers with these types of trap is that when they cease working there will be a "swarm" of wasps recruited to them and those wasps en masse will start looking for alternative food. If that happens to be a hive then the hive will be more hard pressed than trying to combat solitary scouting wasps.

 

[Nannysbees]

Hi Karol, pop bottles work okay if you do them properly. I use a 2 litre bottle with the smallest amount of 'neck' cut off and reversed that I can get away with so that the entrance and the surface of the fluid are as far apart as possible (further to fly back, and helps if it rains). With approx. 10 cm of trapping liquid in the bottom some sort of sweet liquid beer, juice, or water mixed with jam and sugar (never honey) also a few ml of washing up liquid (which is supposed to kill the surface tension to stop wasps standing on the surface and being able to take off again and a little bit of vinegar which is supposed (no idea if it works) to deter bees and other insects going in.

The big problem these in the video seem to have though is they've been left rather than emptied. I don't know how long the traps have been operating but the advantage of pop bottle traps is you can make the top part easily removable so can clean them out frequently.

Apparently these traps were emptied and renewed with bait twice daily. Initially there were no traps and the hives were under attack.

 

[citrus]

Hi Citrus,

I'll quite happily answer questions on wasp behaviour, integrated wasp management and generically on trapping but respectfully will decline to answer specific questions regarding WaspBane traps so as not to contravene the spirit of the forum viz promotion/advertising.

Hi Karol/WaspBane users ....

So have 4 hives and bought a couple of waspbanes ... i have seen the odd wasp about already in the rest of the garden but not where the hives are but wanted to check in on when is the best time to deploy them ( do I need to deploy both of them) ?

Cheers

Chris

 

[Erichalfbee]

Hi Karol/WaspBane users ....

So have 4 hives and bought a couple of waspbanes ... i have seen the odd wasp about already in the rest of the garden but not where the hives are but wanted to check in on when is the best time to deploy them ( do I need to deploy both of them) ?

Cheers

Chris

When the wasps are sweet feeding at the end of summer

 

[Karol]

High efficiency traps are not a substitute for good integrated wasp management around the apiary. Before setting any traps it's important to get the basics right such as minimizing the 'draw' of the apiary by ensuring there are no extraneous sugar sources in the vicinity of the hive including those generated outside of the hives such as fruit litter and low efficiency traps. The draw of an apiary also includes stress pheromones of wasps themselves so it's a bad idea to squash wasps on the hives as this can induce heightened wasp attraction. It is also critical to ensure each hive entrance can be properly defended by the colony which essentially means that entrances are a dynamic feature that need to reflect hive strength. Typically they need to be of tunnel design and whilst the length and height can be fixed at not less than 100mm length and 8-10mm height, the width needs to vary depending on the strength and activity of the colony. This can be achieved by having variable width shims. The width of a tunnel entrance mustn't be reduced to a single bee width because the hive won't be able to defend the tunnel in depth only the entrance or exit to the tunnel. I hope that makes sense. Optimum entrances are defended along the whole length of the tunnel which can't happen if the tunnel is a single bee width. Building up the strength of the hive is critical so making sure the hive has adequate provisions in the absence of good flow is a part of good integrated wasp management.

Only once all of the above fail would I recommend setting high efficiency traps. The exception to this is if one can't regularly monitor the hives at frequent intervals (preferrably daily) to assess how well the hives are able to defend themselves. If they start showing signs of successful wasp ingress then that's the time to set the traps. If one can't monitor regularly then one may consider deploying high efficiency traps as a precaution. This also applies to nucs where by definition hive strength may be low. In any event, there's little to be gained setting high efficiency traps before wasps start sweet feeding, usually not before mid to late July. The exception to this is if one has an active pest controller or two in the area treating nests which may precipitate earlier sweet feeding of the surviving foraging wasps.

 

[citrus]

Thanks Karol ... getting that time of the season ... not had any trouble yet and hives strong enough - will make an effort and clear up the windfalls off the trees tho to help the plume reduction.