Current Events > got a pretty gnarly hornet nest in my front yard. kill it or wait till winter?

(+) Yeah! (+)

had a new dishwasher delivered this AM and the drivers pointed out that i have a pretty gnarly hornet nest hanging from a tree in my front yard, right next to the street.

never had to deal with one of these before. should i leave it be until winter when they all die off and just remove it myself or should i pay someone to deal with it now?

they're the black/white ones fwiw
---

Kill it as soon as you can. In the autumn, as they're dying, they'll turn really nasty.
---

burn the yard
---

SSJGrimReaper posted...

burn the yard

considered it but my house sits on it so that might be a bit overkill
---

Giant_Aspirin posted...

SSJGrimReaper posted...

burn the yard

considered it but my house sits on it so that might be a bit overkill

sometimes you gotta make some sacrifices
---

SSJGrimReaper posted...

Giant_Aspirin posted...

SSJGrimReaper posted...

burn the yard

considered it but my house sits on it so that might be a bit overkill

sometimes you gotta make some sacrifices

i do have some crabgrass that keeps spreading. maybe you're onto something here.
---

Highwind07 posted...

I would kill it off before it gets worse. I had a small nest that kept hanging and rebuilding itself in the back of my store and it was a pain in the ass just dealing with a few hornets flying around everytime that I went out back.

If it is just a nest that is the size of your fist then I would just poke it and run. If it is any bigger then I would call a pro.

it's like the size of a soccer ball.

its right next to the sidewalk so im worried the little bastards will bother people walking past
---

I would whip a foot ball at it around dusk and then book it inside the house.

If you're good you can likely knock it down and then come back out in the middle of the night and spray the nest with that foam stuff. Problem solved.
---

Wait until early morning or night and spray it with some hornet killer. Then run like hell. That's what I do <_<
---

Basically, you have three options.

Option 1 is to get a beekeeper's outfit, a ladder, and several cans of hornet spray (anything with something that has an ingredient ending in "rethrin", pyrethrins are highly effective neurotoxins derived from Old World crysanthemums). Wait until night, put on the outfit, set the ladder against the tree, ascend and soak that fucker down.

Option 2 is similar, but instead of insecticide, you pour some gasoline on the nest, then light it (after disposing of the container you had the gasoline in, obviously).

Option 3 is a two-person job. Get a big trash can (one of the tall round ones) and set it under the nest. Again at night, head up the ladder, but this time you have a pair of hedge trimmers (to sever the connection to the tree). Snip, the nest falls, your partner slams the lid on the can, and the two of you run like hell through the open door of your house, slamming it behind you and praising your chosen god.
---

Also, put it in a box labeled with an "H," and give it to the man that broke of his engagement, and broke the heart of the girl you love.
---

---

Just get a can of RAID wasp and hornet killer and a set of balls. That shit will spray like 25 feet away just start spraying and don't stop until the can is empty and the nest is soaking wet with poison. Try to get them early when it's colder.

I just had to do it with a nest of black wasps in my hedges.
---

DiScOrD tHe LuNaTiC posted...

Wait until night, put on the outfit, set the ladder against the tree, ascend and soak that f***er down.

IIRC twilight is the time to do it because the nest will be mostly empty

theyll return to it, and then die.

Giant_Aspirin posted...

it's like the size of a soccer ball.

call an exterminator, dude.
---

DiScOrD tHe LuNaTiC posted...

Basically, you have three options.

Option 1 is to get a beekeeper's outfit, a ladder, and several cans of hornet spray (anything with something that has an ingredient ending in "rethrin", pyrethrins are highly effective neurotoxins derived from Old World crysanthemums). Wait until night, put on the outfit, set the ladder against the tree, ascend and soak that fucker down.

Option 2 is similar, but instead of insecticide, you pour some gasoline on the nest, then light it (after disposing of the container you had the gasoline in, obviously).

Option 3 is a two-person job. Get a big trash can (one of the tall round ones) and set it under the nest. Again at night, head up the ladder, but this time you have a pair of hedge trimmers (to sever the connection to the tree). Snip, the nest falls, your partner slams the lid on the can, and the two of you run like hell through the open door of your house, slamming it behind you and praising your chosen god.

I just want to say that out of these, option 1 works the best and is most reliable and most safe. Once you start spraying the nest they'll come out to attack you and die as they're leaving the nest. You'll get to see them fly out and get hit by the poison and fall onto their backs flopping their legs around so hard that they fall off while you scream things like "I AM GOD"
---

Tyranthraxus posted...

I just want to say that out of these, option 1 works the best and is most reliable and most safe. Once you start spraying the nest they'll come out to attack you and die as they're leaving the nest. You'll get to see them fly out and get hit by the poison and fall onto their backs flopping their legs around so hard that they fall off while you scream things like "I AM GOD"

i just want to say that doing this untrained on a nest 'the size of a soccer ball' nearly guarnatees some will make it to you and sting you repeatedly

but also doing it while they're home is just foolish; you want to do it when the nest is empty so they die on their return

i have dealt with a bunch of mini nests over the years because my idiot husky tries to eat the hornets and i always do it at sunset
---

thinking i should contact a professional and do it sooner than later.

thanks for the feedback, guys
---

Giant_Aspirin posted...

thinking i should contact a professional and do it sooner than later.

thanks for the feedback, guys

God damn what's with common sense here all of a sudden
---

Licensed pest control technician, reporting in.

Those are bald-faced hornets. And yeah they're incredibly aggressive. Whether you should eliminate them honestly depends on how in the way they are.

If the nest is hanging like, only 7 or 8 feet in the air, and it's close to your walkway, then you might want to consider calling a company to get rid of it.
If it's more like 10 feet or more up in the air, people walking on the ground will be far enough away from their flight path that they won't present much of a problem. We're deep into wasp/hornet season, so if it's only the size of a soccer ball now, it won't get too much bigger and they'll probably die off by November. (And no, they won't get nastier the later in the year it gets as one poster said. The cooler the weather gets, the less aggressive they'll be since they can't move as fast or fly as well when it's colder)

Whatever you do, do NOT try and knock it down or treat it yourself, even at night. A nest that size will contain several hundred of them, and they don't fuck around if they think their home is in danger. The only way to destroy it is by chopping it open, spraying it down on the inside so that the entirety of the nest is soaked with pesticide, and the queen is killed. Spraying wasp freeze on the outside will kill some, but it won't get rid of the nest, and just knocking the nest down is going to make them even more aggressive than they already are.
Also, other mistruth floating around this topic, there's always going to be hornets inside. There's no point where they all just leave, and it's safe to go after them.

tl;dr if it's far enough up in the tree that they're not going after you or anyone, just ignore it and they'll clear out in like 3 months. If it's close to eye level, near a walkway, call a pro. Don't try it yourself.
---

^He's a level 36 ForestWanderer, his word can be trusted
---

Nuke it from space.
---

i just called the top rated exterminator on Angie's list for my area and the initial quote they gave me was $200-$250+tax. sheesh.

ForestLogic posted...

If the nest is hanging like, only 7 or 8 feet in the air, and it's close to your walkway, then you might want to consider calling a company to get rid of it.
If it's more like 10 feet or more up in the air, people walking on the ground will be far enough away from their flight path that they won't present much of a problem.

it's ~10-15 feet in the air (it was near the top of a standard box/delivery truck).

thanks for the detailed info, mister.
---

Eat its children.

ForestLogic posted...

Also, other mistruth floating around this topic, there's always going to be hornets inside. There's no point where they all just leave, and it's safe to go after them.

This is absolutely true for a nest of that size, no question.

Since you know your stuff, is it really not true for much smaller nests? I've only ever treated nests about a quarter of the size he's dealing with, and hitting at twilight I never saw any come out. I'll stop doing it myself and switch to just paying experts if that's the case.
---

As much as I hate yellow jackets, if it's that high up I'd wait for winter to kill them. It's very risky trying to spray it and then remove the nest.
---

SSJGrimReaper posted...

Theres also this option
---

Burn something under it in a metal pail or bucket. The smoke will get them out, and you can get rid of the nest.
---

Future_Trunks posted...

Take fucking pics, OP

at work rn but i can when i get home later this evening.
---

Dude, get rid of them now. You wait too long, they're gunna get into your place and could nest inside your walls.

There's only one thing to do - learn the language of the hornets, earn their trust, and breed with their women. And in time your differences will be forgotten.
---

chairforceone posted...

Dude, get rid of them now. You wait too long, they're gunna get into your place and could nest inside your walls.

Traditional yellowjackets will, but aerial ones (which include bald faced hornets) will not nest underground or in walls.
---

chairforceone posted...

Dude, get rid of them now. You wait too long, they're gunna get into your place and could nest inside your walls.

Lol this is so unbelievably false.

Giant_Aspirin posted...

just called the top rated exterminator on Angie's list for my area and the initial quote they gave me was $200-$250+tax. sheesh. @ForestLogic, is that a reasonable price? seemed quite high to me but i've never dealt with anything like this before.

Yeah that seems a little bit high to me. But tbqh if they're at least 10 feet in the air, I wouldn't even bother. (Which might also be why they're giving such a high price. Dunno about other companies, but with us if a worker needs to get in a ladder to treat it, the price goes up lol)
Regardless though, the fact you went the whole summer so far without even noticing it suggests that it's out of the way enough to ignore it. Like I said, come November they'll all die, except the queen who will go hibernate somewhere else. But either way, they won't reuse that nest, so once they're all gone you can take it down and get a cool science project
---

alright well im gonna trust the expert here and leave it be until winter and then just knock it down and throw it away.
---

Growing up on a country road we had the benefit of blowing those away with shotguns. And boy was it fun. Take a shot, run inside and wait for the swarm to disperse, repeat until it was blown to shreds. One time though one of those fuckers got me three times in the eyelid, the one time we decided to get too close.
---

voldothegr8 posted...

Growing up on a country road we had the benefit of blowing those away with shotguns. And boy was it fun. Take a shot, run inside and wait for the swarm to disperse, repeat until it was blown to shreds. One time though one of those fuckers got me three times in the eyelid, the one time we decided to get too close.

get er dun
---

Giant_Aspirin posted...

alright well im gonna trust the expert here and leave it be until winter and then just knock it down and throw it away.

i figured out the other option... though this is more fun and it will really piss off the hornet. get a drone helicopter have it hit the nest over and over again until it gets knocked down. really don't have a good plan after that.
---

It's probably just over 10 feet in the air. And it's probably bigger than a soccer ball but I'm not getting any closer.

http://imgur.com/a/3YbHzlr
---

SparkClark posted...

It's probably just over 10 feet in the air. And it's probably bigger than a soccer ball but I'm not getting any closer.

http://imgur.com/a/3YbHzlr

It's over. Move to a new state. Nukes will be launched within the next few hours.
---

Yeah that doesn't look like a big deal, high up enough. It's pretty standard size.

I'd say just keep an eye on it and if you notice anyone getting harassed by them, consider getting it taken care of. But it's pretty far from your house.
---

who's that guy in the background who casually walked past it like a badass
---

ForestLogic posted...

Yeah that doesn't look like a big deal, high up enough. It's pretty standard size.

I'd say just keep an eye on it and if you notice anyone getting harassed by them, consider getting it taken care of. But it's pretty far from your house.

i talked about it with a few people at work and a number of them pointed out that it's probably been there for a while now due to the size and it hasn't been a problem so far. and i walk past my house ~3 times a day while walking my dogs and never noticed it or got bothered by the little bastards.

unless a neighbor complains or i notice them being a pest to folks walking past then i'm leaving it be.

SSJGrimReaper posted...

who's that guy in the background who casually walked past it like a badass

roommate
---