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Wasp nests and control in 2014.
Well wasp nest season is finally here and I’m bracing myself for one of my busiest yet. Three years ago pest controllers up and down the country had hardly any calls for wasps due to a small blip in the weather. As the weather begins to warm up in the early spring the queen wasps awake from their over winter hibernation. They then set to work building a tiny wasps nest to lay their first set of eggs in. If the weather goes cold during this time then the queen will literally freeze to death as she builds this nest. That is exactly what happened three years ago. Indeed I’m still finding small queen built wasp nests in peoples lofts from that spring.
A small dead wasps nest killed in a past cold spring.
Queen Wasp Survival
BUT….this year its different! Over the winter we hardly had any really cold weather so queens had a really good hibernation. The queen wasps will spend the the winter anywhere they can settle down, this might be a perfect place, such as tucked up in your loft insulation….or a rather colder spot such as in your garden wall. These wasps that don’t pick the best place will often not make it through the winter even in a normal year. This natural mortality will kill off a good percentage of wasps and will give an average wasp year. This winter just gone was one of the warmest I can remember, I cant remember even one good frost…..meaning every queen than got out of the wind and rain ready for her big sleep stood a fantastic chance of seeing the winter through…. and now they are awake and nest building like mad!
Wasp Problem Areas
So which areas area going to cause the most problems in 2014? Given that wasps in most areas will have survived then I would say we are going to be seeing calls from all areas. If it had been a normal winter then areas around Bolton and Wigan that are near to fields such as Bromily Cross, Dunscar and Platt Bridge would see slightly less calls than Bolton and Wigan town centers as the town areas have more places for a successful hibernation. Town centers and cities always record slightly higher temperatures than rural or suburban locations. We often find higher wasp mortality in suburban areas. This year though many wasps will have survived even in field walls and hedgerows so its gong to be all go right across Lancashire and the North West!
