Look what I found outside my backdoor.

[beachbum_al]

For those who get the queasy from seeing bugs don't look any further.

Just outside my backdoor I found these. And yes I am allergic to them but I couldn't resist snapping a couple of pictures from a distance.

[stormtruth]

Yikes. Might want to remove that before it is five times a big.

[beachbum_al]

Doing it tonight. I can't do it but one of our friends are coming over to remove it. I didn't even know it was there until this morning when I walked outside.

[CajunMama]

[Pburgh]

Those little suckers seem to build those things overnight!!!!!

[kevin]

[JonathanBelles]

ive got 5 or 6 of those on my house

[Rainband]

Yikes. Tony and I have had to dodge those this summer. We don't smoke in our house and we sit out on the porch alot. They keep trying to build a nest and we keep spraying the buggers.

[CajunMama]

Is it a covered porch? If it is, try painting it a lite blue and they won't build thinking it's the sky.

[Miss Mary]

If I was any good at posting pics, I'd post one of.....

.....an Epi-Pen!!! Since you said you were allergic.....I am too! Be careful beachbum_al.

Mary

[breeze]

Is it a covered porch? If it is, try painting it a lite blue and they won't build thinking it's the sky.

I recently learned that, too, and, they say it works! My front porch needs
a good coat of sky blue paint! I just busted a nest of the rascals trying to
build on the front porch, using Spectracide Wasp & Hornet Killer.
LOL, I opened the front door, leaned out, and hit them with that
25-foot spray, and, closed the door, in a hurry!

Don't forget to knock the nest down, in a couple of days, so they
don't build back in it.

~Annette~

[MGC]

I got hit by a couple of these little %&^*^ the other day. Little did I know but a nest was under my lawn chair. Got me twice on the leg.....MGC

[Meso]

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEK!!!! Makes me want to run away from my pc screen! Those things scare the *&%$ out of me :S EVVVIIIILLL spawns of satan!!

[TexasStooge]

I hate those wasps!

Once, they were building a nest above the door of my family's apartment door 10 years ago, and again outside near a bedroom window.

I gotta get me one of these wasp traps.

[coriolis]

&%^$#% Yellow Jackets. I hit a nest of them once when mowing, and I collected about a dozen stings. It made me light headed and weak for a while. I don't know if I'm developing an allergy, but I always keep some benadryl around.

I always keep one of those long range spray cans around too. DIE BUGS!

[Miss Mary]

That's a very good idea Ed. Before I was 38, I was stung many times on soccer fields. I didn't have allergic reactions to any of these stings, they were just very painful, but locally (minimal swelling). Then I was coiling up my garden hose after watering flowers one day and got stung by a yellow jacket. On the hand. It hurt 10 times more than previous stings but the swelling was local, just a quarter sized area around the sting. The girls and I went on with our day - story time at the library (they were 3 and 6 then). 30 minutes later we pulled into the library's parking lot and I noticed I was feeling very odd. I looked in my rear view mirror and saw that I was experiencing lip swelling. I knew enough to check for hives (oldest daughter has a peanut allergy), sure enough I thought I saw them on my chest and arms. I quickly took some of Nina's Benadryl. But the symptoms continued. By this point we were in the library and I kept going to the bathroom. To check for more symptoms. More swelling, hives, near dizzy feeling, the top of my head felt so odd. Later I was told that was my blood pressure going up. We were 2 blocks from a Urgent Care facility so I drove myself there. Not really a good idea but we managed (we had ins. coverage but I knew they wouldn't cover an ambulance bill). I walked in and they took me immediately. I kept saying - but I'm not allergic to bees! They kept saying - ah, but you are maam! LOL I ended up with 2 more oral meds and 2 shots, one in each arm. I had to use to phone at one point to call my husband and the bottoms of my feet were rounded, extremely swollen. Nurses said don't take your shoes off, you'll never get them on again! The swelling went down in 15 minutes. All I can is it was a very frightening experience. My husband had to leave work, all the meds they gave me literally felt like I was drunk. Somehow a neighbor helped him get my car home. The doctor said - you are NOW allergic to bee stings. Any sting. Also, I had to take Benadryl around the clock every 6 hours, for 5 straight days. Setting the alarm in the middle of the night to take it. Otherwise my symptoms could have returned. I was truly out of it for 5 days! Since there are about 4 types of bees, he said to keep an Epi-Pen and Bendryl with me, ice a sting immediately and watch it. Each one has the capability of turning into an anaphylactic reaction like I had at age 38. I'm 51 now and I have to say subsequent stings have been less severe. One sting on my calf caused swelling below the knee, if it went above my knee I was to head to the ER b/c it could have traveled to my heart. So each time I'm stung, I follow doctor's orders. But I haven't been stung by a yellow jacket. They buzz by me and I say - no, I don't have time for an ER run today. Somehow they leave me alone now (but I also no longer plant annuals). I still faithfully carry the meds though.

I was also told you can develop allergies at any age. The doctor wasn't surprised at all I had been stung many times prior to age 38 and didn't have allergic reactions.

It's just a good thing we weren't in the wilderness somewhere or out in the country!

Mary

PS - I should add, that even though I'm told to use the Epi-Pen and Benadryl for a full blown reaction like the anaphylactic one, I still need to go to the ER. The Epi and Benadryl combined slow your symptoms down, giving you time to get to the ER. But you need longer acting epinephrine, meds the public cannot carry. If you don't go to an ER with these symptoms, you will die. I need to make that very clear. The worst case scenario is your throat will become so swollen inside, that it will close up and you will not be able to breathe. You do not want to ignore allergic reactions like this! My little speech is over now......

[angelwing]

ACK ACK ACK!!! Those things RUN! I've been stung by them and the extremity that was stung got completely numb and I couldn't walk the one time for a week and the one time I got stung on my elbow and couldn't use my right arm...ACK ACK ACK

When I was living at home, we had awnings over our dining room windows and we never had wasp nests, we had HORNETS!!! Talk about scary, those suckers are LOUD and man were they a ******* to get rid of!!!

[alicia-w]

http://www.gardensalive.com/product.asp ... 1154027500

[jusforsean]

i took one off the other day they had buit on an artificial tree on my portch, yikes

[HurriCat]

During the warmer months here in Orlando, I walk around the house and yard about once every two weeks, armed with the long-range spray can. I check all of the roof overhangs and around the electric/utility pipes, etc. These guys will build INSIDE of things, too. In the school portable classroom fields, our phone and data connection "cans" would reveal big nests. And then there are the "ground wasps" that build huge nests underground and livestock, pets and even guys operating digging equipment have fallen into these "pits".

I HAVE on occasion left a smaller nest out back, away from our activity areas. The wasps DO provide a degree of natural pest control - especially with the SPIDER populations. Speaking of that, the wasp will be hovering and searching around the house and will even come up to you for a look-see. They are searching for prey, not out to get you. If you freak-out and immediately start swatting at the wasp, then it will likely react aggressively to your "attack". The time they DO get all is if you accidentally - or not - hit their nest or get too close after something or someone else has gotten them all riled-up. The best time for inspections and erradications is in the coolest part of the mornings, when the wasps are all on the nest and huddled together. They are pretty cold-sensitive and are much more docile when it's cool out. I've been on patrol for over four years and have never been stung. I get all when one is hovering close by, checking me for spiders and bugs, but I just stay still. Within seconds he goes on his merry way.

Oh - about allergic reactions and all - it is a good idea to not only keep treatment supplies on-hand - especially in Florida - but to check the EXPIRATION DATES on the items. My brother-in-law is very allergic and one sting could "take care" of him. Well, his dad happened to look in the car's glove-box - yep - the anti-sting kit was two years out of date!