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Wasps... or perhaps hornets
Jun. 8th, 2005 08:53 amI live in a ranch house with a partially finished basement where I store the majority of my paperbacks. Last night as I went to install the new dehumidifier, I discovered that there are wasps in the dropped ceiling.
One wasp is a wanderer that got lost. Two wasps is a potential problem. Three wasps is one of those "Aw shit" moments-- though my actually language was a tad stronger.
Since I have no interest in being the person to take apart the ceiling to find out where the wasps are living, I'm spending this morning on the phone trying to figure out what I can do short of nuking the house.
And the dehumidifier isn't installed yet, since doing so would involve turning on the fluorescent light fixture where the wasps were discovered, and I'm not interested in pissing them off.
Update: Professional opinion is that I do not have a nest in the basement. The wasps (or possibly ground bees to use the professional term) may have wandered in. The dropped ceiling was taken apart and after technician performed initial inspection, I then went down to take a look, and agreed that there was no sign of nest in basement. Thorough search of house inside and out did not reveal any nests nor obvious signs of entry. Nor did we see any activity that would normally be present during the day, with bees going back and forth from nest. So my next move is to continue to carefully observe, and if I see another bee I should kill it and preserve the corpse for inspection.
On the plus side, you've got to love a guy who confesses disappointment at not finding a nest because "He was really looking forward to killing something today."
One wasp is a wanderer that got lost. Two wasps is a potential problem. Three wasps is one of those "Aw shit" moments-- though my actually language was a tad stronger.
Since I have no interest in being the person to take apart the ceiling to find out where the wasps are living, I'm spending this morning on the phone trying to figure out what I can do short of nuking the house.
And the dehumidifier isn't installed yet, since doing so would involve turning on the fluorescent light fixture where the wasps were discovered, and I'm not interested in pissing them off.
Update: Professional opinion is that I do not have a nest in the basement. The wasps (or possibly ground bees to use the professional term) may have wandered in. The dropped ceiling was taken apart and after technician performed initial inspection, I then went down to take a look, and agreed that there was no sign of nest in basement. Thorough search of house inside and out did not reveal any nests nor obvious signs of entry. Nor did we see any activity that would normally be present during the day, with bees going back and forth from nest. So my next move is to continue to carefully observe, and if I see another bee I should kill it and preserve the corpse for inspection.
On the plus side, you've got to love a guy who confesses disappointment at not finding a nest because "He was really looking forward to killing something today."
