I have Wasps help!

[oliver90owner]

Ask in the beginners section , he won't bother you there

Yeah, do that. You will get all the 'nice replies', not the truth.

The section where you will get a mixture of 'sorree it happened to you' and 'such hard luck'. When actually you really asked for the problem by not learning anything before getting into beekeeping, or rather becoming a keeper of bees. Less than subtle difference, I'm afraid. Don't read, don't learn.

Beekeeping is basically simple. You keep them within some simple, sound parameters and they are able to look after themselves. Deviate (some wildly from the expected norm) and you can expect trouble. Far better to be prepared and know/understand the boundaries, than trying to correct things after they have been needlessly driven outside those safe boundaries.

How often have I recommended later splits due to problems of getting queens mated in the fickle UK spring weather, but not so late as to have weak colonies unable to resist wasp attack in August? Umpteen times!

But, nevermind, victor will get you through - to the next time....

Good luck, you will need it, by the replies on here.

 

[bontbee]

Usually fruit first followed by meat as they try and survive

Ain't it t'other way round? Meat first, as the grubs' protein needs have to be satisfied by meat, (caterpillars, aphids, ham sandwich, charcuterie). The grubs, in return, feed the adults with a sweet carbohydrate-rich solution - one that happens to contain enzymes that start the breakdown of the protein foods the adults bring back. Once the nest has fulfilled its function of raising the next generation, colony coherence is lost, no more grubs are raised, so all those adults, (that were being spoon fed by the larvae), have to go out and find their own carbs.

Wasps are just as fascinating and beautifully organised as honey bees. Why oh why do beekeepers insist on slaughtering wasps when the remedy is in their own hands....Don't be surprised if the wasps take up the offer of a (nearly) free lunch.

Hope you have managed to sort out your hives for this year, beepig. I'm sure you'll be ready next year.

 

[beepig]

Thanks Bontpee, i will be better prepared of course. I think i have done quite well learning intensively with three colonies not knowing a scrap back in March when i rescued them from extinction after fifteen months neglect.
And yes i think it is meat first your right.

 

[Hivemaker.]

Beepig.... keep your Ethnic/racial views off this forum.

 

[Fatbee]

Here here Hivemaker. I second that.

And one final thought on robbing, our dearly beloved little darlings are not beyond a spot of armed robbery themselves. It's nature, it's hard - you just got to work with it

 

[TOBY-3652]

Beepig.... keep your Ethnic/racial views off this forum.

 

[Amari]

Ask in the beginners section , he won't bother you there

Yeah, do that. You will get all the 'nice replies', not the truth.

The section where you will get a mixture of 'sorree it happened to you' and 'such hard luck'. When actually you really asked for the problem by not learning anything before getting into beekeeping, or rather becoming a keeper of bees. Less than subtle difference, I'm afraid. Don't read, don't learn.
Beekeeping is basically simple. You keep them within some simple, sound parameters and they are able to look after themselves. Deviate (some wildly from the expected norm) and you can expect trouble. Far better to be prepared and know/understand the boundaries, than trying to correct things after they have been needlessly driven outside those safe boundaries.
How often have I recommended later splits due to problems of getting queens mated in the fickle UK spring weather, but not so late as to have weak colonies unable to resist wasp attack in August? Umpteen times!
But, nevermind, victor will get you through - to the next time....
Good luck, you will need it, by the replies on here.

There seems to be a positive correlation between the number of posts and hubris. You rival F*nman

 

[B Special]

After reading this thread from start to finish I have learnt a hell of a lot.

 

[Karol]

I think the best plan of action is to defeat the scouts before the swarm feeding happens. I think I will start putting my entrance block in all year round and see how that goes, if it slows them during a flow then I'll monitor and pop it out but make sure I have it to hand at every inspection to put back on.

Out of interest Kaz did you manage to read the section on line of entry and hive entrances? You can have quite a 'wide' entrance so long as it's 'deep' enough. With that kind of arrangement you get the best of both worlds. The sentry bees regulate ingress and egress of foragers so automatically accommodating periods of high flow whilst still being able to competently repel wasps should the situation arise.

 

[Karol]

<snip>

Wasps are just as fascinating and beautifully organised as honey bees. Why oh why do beekeepers insist on slaughtering wasps when the remedy is in their own hands....Don't be surprised if the wasps take up the offer of a (nearly) free lunch.

<snip>

Couldn't agree more.

It's a shame that so many beekeepers see wasps simply as the enemy. It's a perception that couldn't be further from the truth. Wasps are more of an 'ally' than we care to acknowledge and they are more closely integrated with plants than honeybees.

I would be very surprised if many beekeepers link the volume and quality of the honey their bees produce to the contribution made by wasps in looking after the plants that honeybees depend on. Wasps perform a myriad of gardening duties in the natural world and most of them benefit plants. As has been mentioned wasps behave as pollinators during certain parts of their life cycle but that's as nothing compared to their gardening duties.

In nature when wasps take wood for nest building, where do they get that wood from? Fallen trees! Why is this important? Because in nature wasps help break down fallen trees to create space for new growth which in turn provides new blooms for honeybees to work on. May not sound like much but the amount of wood that wasps harvest is actually quite significant and more over, this wood pulping activity of theirs enables the ingress of mould and fungi to speed up the break down of trees. Wasps are substantial carbon chain vectors.

Wasps then tend their plants and keep them relatively pest free and we're not talking the odd insect here and there. We are talking between 4 and 5 metric tonnes per wasp nest, i.e. up to 4 to 5,000 metric tonnes of insect pest per square mile. Ever stop to think how much damage to blooms that level of insect infestation would have and how much of an impact that would have on honey yields? I suspect not.

The other thing that I find sad is that there is little understanding that wasps are easily manageable in a sustained and ecologically intelligent way. I see a lot of 'wasp control' that is naïve and counter productive. For example, treating wasp nests during the hunting phase of their life cycle merely serves to create more nuisance wasps NOT less!

Why? Well, it comes down to understanding that foraging wasps require permission from their sentries to enter their nests. In treating a wasp nest the first wasps to die are the sentries. This results in the foragers never re-entering their nests. Why is this important? Because it means that during the hunting phase when the foragers are denied their food source from their grubs within their nest they are forced to seek carbohydrates elsewhere which means they are more likely to attack bee hives for honey or individual honeybees for the nectar contained in their abdomens. So treating nests in the wrong way at the wrong time of year actually increases the risk of wasp attack rather than decreases it!!!

Using integrated wasp management it is a relatively straight forward thing to protect bee hives from wasps but it requires knowledge and a fundamental respect of wasps and how and why they behave the way they do. Wasps have three castes the same as honeybees. It's only the workers that are a nuisance for a short period of the year and it is relatively easy with the right knowledge to specifically target just those nuisance workers without affecting the species as a whole. It's called having your cake and eating it!

 

[beepig]

I bow to your superior knowledge Karol,a very interesting and informative piece. I for one will look again at my attitude toward Wasps...very pleased you posted/
Might be interesting to hear your views toward integrated wasp management

 

[victor meldrew]

Ask in the beginners section , he won't bother you there



Yeah, do that. You will get all the 'nice replies', not the truth.



The section where you will get a mixture of 'sorree it happened to you' and 'such hard luck'. When actually you really asked for the problem by not learning anything before getting into beekeeping, or rather becoming a keeper of bees. Less than subtle difference, I'm afraid. Don't read, don't learn.



Beekeeping is basically simple. You keep them within some simple, sound parameters and they are able to look after themselves. Deviate (some wildly from the expected norm) and you can expect trouble. Far better to be prepared and know/understand the boundaries, than trying to correct things after they have been needlessly driven outside those safe boundaries.



How often have I recommended later splits due to problems of getting queens mated in the fickle UK spring weather, but not so late as to have weak colonies unable to resist wasp attack in August? Umpteen times!



But, nevermind, victor will get you through - to the next time....



Good luck, you will need it, by the replies on here.

Of course I'll help but not by suggesting an immediate problem is solved by reading a book!
And certainly not by inflicting a diatribe as above.
What with your silly tag of "Shirley " when the word is surely . Points towards the egomaniac and results in the self generated bad press you receive , or is that 'Welcome'?
You sir are neither the font of all knowledge, nor a candidate for recruitment by the Samaritans .
VM


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Erichalfbee]

Might be interesting to hear your views toward integrated wasp management

It's on the waspbane site

 

[kazmcc]

Out of interest Kaz did you manage to read the section on line of entry and hive entrances? You can have quite a 'wide' entrance so long as it's 'deep' enough. With that kind of arrangement you get the best of both worlds. The sentry bees regulate ingress and egress of foragers so automatically accommodating periods of high flow whilst still being able to competently repel wasps should the situation arise.

Still can't get that link to work. HIs has a new laptop so I'll see if I can access it on that today. I've read pretty much everything you've written on the forum about wasps, thank you for posting. I've learned a lot!

 

[Ely]

Couldn't agree more.

It's a shame that so many beekeepers see wasps simply as the enemy. It's a perception that couldn't be further from the truth. Wasps are more of an 'ally' than we care to acknowledge and they are more closely integrated with plants than honeybees.

I would be very surprised if many beekeepers link the volume and quality of the honey their bees produce to the contribution made by wasps in looking after the plants that honeybees depend on. Wasps perform a myriad of gardening duties in the natural world and most of them benefit plants. As has been mentioned wasps behave as pollinators during certain parts of their life cycle but that's as nothing compared to their gardening duties.

In nature when wasps take wood for nest building, where do they get that wood from? Fallen trees! Why is this important? Because in nature wasps help break down fallen trees to create space for new growth which in turn provides new blooms for honeybees to work on. May not sound like much but the amount of wood that wasps harvest is actually quite significant and more over, this wood pulping activity of theirs enables the ingress of mould and fungi to speed up the break down of trees. Wasps are substantial carbon chain vectors.

Wasps then tend their plants and keep them relatively pest free and we're not talking the odd insect here and there. We are talking between 4 and 5 metric tonnes per wasp nest, i.e. up to 4 to 5,000 metric tonnes of insect pest per square mile. Ever stop to think how much damage to blooms that level of insect infestation would have and how much of an impact that would have on honey yields? I suspect not.

The other thing that I find sad is that there is little understanding that wasps are easily manageable in a sustained and ecologically intelligent way. I see a lot of 'wasp control' that is naïve and counter productive. For example, treating wasp nests during the hunting phase of their life cycle merely serves to create more nuisance wasps NOT less!

Why? Well, it comes down to understanding that foraging wasps require permission from their sentries to enter their nests. In treating a wasp nest the first wasps to die are the sentries. This results in the foragers never re-entering their nests. Why is this important? Because it means that during the hunting phase when the foragers are denied their food source from their grubs within their nest they are forced to seek carbohydrates elsewhere which means they are more likely to attack bee hives for honey or individual honeybees for the nectar contained in their abdomens. So treating nests in the wrong way at the wrong time of year actually increases the risk of wasp attack rather than decreases it!!!

Using integrated wasp management it is a relatively straight forward thing to protect bee hives from wasps but it requires knowledge and a fundamental respect of wasps and how and why they behave the way they do. Wasps have three castes the same as honeybees. It's only the workers that are a nuisance for a short period of the year and it is relatively easy with the right knowledge to specifically target just those nuisance workers without affecting the species as a whole. It's called having your cake and eating it!

Interesting stuff. I never knew how interesting wasps were. I have nothing against them although I am biased as I have never been stung by one

 

[davidchevell]

Wasps

You need to make the entrance as small as possible by what every means so the bees can defend , foam , strip of cardboard , piece of wood get creative , you could also have a look around for the wasp nest and deal with them .

 

[bontbee]

Davec - please leave the nests alone!!

There are few occasions where nest destruction can be justified. I go out to people locally who have wasp nests and by far the majority of householders are willing to live with the wasps - once they realise that they are not "useless" and "just out to sting".

(PS Does anyone know what role horseflies play?????)

 

[REDWOOD]

Davec - please leave the nests alone!!

There are few occasions where nest destruction can be justified. I go out to people locally who have wasp nests and by far the majority of householders are willing to live with the wasps - once they realise that they are not "useless" and "just out to sting".

(PS Does anyone know what role horseflies play?????)

All I know about horseflies is they love me to death and every time I get a bit I swell up like a pumpkin, I'll stick with bees

 

[kazmcc]

Davec - please leave the nests alone!!

There are few occasions where nest destruction can be justified. I go out to people locally who have wasp nests and by far the majority of householders are willing to live with the wasps - once they realise that they are not "useless" and "just out to sting".

(PS Does anyone know what role horseflies play?????)

bontbee, I would be inclined to leave the one here, but I have children, one who's only 8 and has hearing difficulties so he can't play out on the street with the others. It's in a compost bin right by my gate and they are starting to venture around the front of the house. My garden is tiny, but I haven't noticed them all year until now. No other way for it, they have to go!

 

[bontbee]

Hi kazmcc - it sounds just like one of few occasions referred to - but you don't need to justify it to me.

I just get completely bewildered by the readiness of some beekeepers to slaughter anything - including bees, sometimes!!

If beekeepers are so far removed from a "cycle of life", what hope for the general population - who we find so misguided and ridiculous for confusing a bee and a wasp!!