I used to own a house with two pear trees. I learned to pick up any fruit that dropped, because the pear juice would ferment under the skin in the warm sun, the wasps would pierce the skin and drink the pear liqueur, and then relentlessly chase me around the yard. It turns out that wasps are belligerent drunks, which shouldn't be surprising.
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A bee has never aggressively investigated my lunch and refused to fuck off when I'm eating outside.
Like I'd happily spare some if they'd just get the fuck out of my face
Old thread, but I once actually observed this. It cut a comparatively huge chunk of meat from my burger and sluggishly flew away with it.
Decoy plate: put a lil food for ‘em a distance away from ya. Blew my mind when I first saw someone do that
the ones inspecting human food are one of the few agressive species. take care and maybe set up some traps at the table
This is clearly wasp propaganda because wasps are not cool. They will actually attack you for no reason and then fly away thus indicating they could have always flown away.
Meanwhile bees completely ignore you.
this fuck stung the back of my head last week for the sin of taking out the trash.

Was out for a week for work. Got back to my front door and got attacked by a nest that had been made while I was out. I relished nuking them.
I've been stung by wasps dozens of times. Never been stung by a bee. I say hello to bumble bees. Wasps get none such niceties from me. Except for tarantula hawks. Those guys are way too fucking big not to doff my hat when in presence.
Agreed! I got stung once for the sin of stopping to look at a cute rabbit on a trail. Little fucker just stung my hand for no reason as I stood there. Fuck those guys. And I love insects!
I don't know, they're not all created the same. When I'm in the pool, I let bees land on me, or will fish them out of the water with my hands. Paper wasps look super frightening, but they're even more docile than honey bees. Yellow jackets on the other hand are complete assholes. We had a nest of them in the yard once and they would go way out of their way to sting people, just for the hell of it. Like not anyone close to the nest or anything, just someone on the patio chilling. I would leave a beehive, but I eradicated the yellow jacket nest.
I don't know if this is true but I've heard yellow jackets get intoxicated on fermenting fruit and become mean drunks.
Yellow jackets on the other hand are complete assholes. We had a nest of them in the yard once and they would go way out of their way to sting people, just for the hell of it.
This was my experience too. I had thought that bees had moved into a bush in my yard. I was happy to have bees there. A week later I was mowing the grass and felt several stabs of pain on my back and wrist. I turn around and see the air is filled with them. I had swatted one in my escape and had a corpse to inspect later and found it was a Yellow jacket wasp. From a distance I could see they were entering and exiting a hole near the bottom of the bush. A quick internet search later I knew that they were nearly dormant at night, and that they need a special oil they produce on the outside of their body to breath. Dawn dish soap apparently strips that away and they die, and its not toxic to the ground or environment.
I put half a bottle of Dawn squirted into their hole at the bottom of the bush at night. I never saw another Yellowjack wasp.
Ugh, sounds awful, but glad you found a solution. I don't remember what I put down the hole they had at the base of a tree. Wasn't dawn, I don't think.
Yep, paper wasps are chill as fuck. I had a hive of them living on my deck under the hand rail. I'd go out and chill with them daily with my coffee during that summer. They would stare at me for a bit. Then get back to eating bits of my deck.
I'm so confused, the paper wasps around here are territorial assholes. Had a nest built on my porch and had to stop using that door. We let them be because we built the house in their woods, but they were definitely not chill at all haha
Edit: Did some learning, the regional species of paper wasps we encounter are known not only for their aggression but also their vastly more painful sting. Wonderful!
Which region if I may ask? Id love to know where never to camp ;)
Ozark Mountains! But you should definitely still camp here, I live in the woods and wouldn't trade this area for anything!
It looks wonderful on pictures, but I live in Norrbotten, Sweden so its a bit far away for a camping trip
Norbotten is gorgeous! I'll come camp with you, you come camp with me?!

Its very much summer now
I'm in love! Is that your homestead? I grew up on a farm that my parents still live on, it's astonishingly similar to your neck of the woods, the pasture photo is my parent's place.
It's very dense around my house so hard to photograph, but here are my expecting neighbors! Should have some baby deer jumping and playing around the house soon!
Just so you know, you're the coolest person I've ever seen on the fediverse :)

Nice with that pond as well!
I got a small homestead with goats and meat bunnies, and my partner got horses. I love the life but it prohibits me from the long camping trips I used to do! If have a few lakes around where I pitch my tent when the mood takes me :)
I have a few lakes near me I love to camp on!
It's awesome to know there is someone like me on the other side of the world :)
https://www.swedishtouristassociation.com/guides/public-access-rights/?_gl=1xt0eqe_gcl_au*MTY0ODY3NDY0My4xNzgxNDU4NTAy
Some things to know about camping in Sweden :)
They're fun to watch because they often grab caterpillars from plants and take them away or eat them nearby. Great for gardens.
A few months back I was visiting my retired parents, and I wanted to break the routine a bit and decided to sit at a lakeside table we never used because it was redundant.
As I walked up to the table and sat my stuff down, I heard a “FWOMP” followed by a sound I can only describe as “chitinous rubbing”. I slowly checked my surroundings until I noticed an almost basketball sized mass of wasps waking up that had fallen with part of a hive underneath the table. In a moment of extreme calculation I decided the only one of six things on the table worth risking stings for was the tablet, and I sprinted for the first time in years to get away.
So, I guess thanks to the wasps for the fun new core memory.
Last time I was stung by a wasp I was just standing on the street. I wasn't even moving. I was standing for about 30 minutes waiting when suddenly a wasp came, stung me on the neck and went away flying.
It was a "fuck you in particular" with qll the letters.
That happened to me too. I was standing in line at the bakery and got stung in the neck by a fucking wasp I didn't even see coming. Fuck those guys.
Literally my exact story with some Minor details.
Standing at bus stop, arms crossed, staring into distance, 15 minute wait
Watched the fucker fly from across the street, land on my arm, sting me, fly away
I've been stung by a bee exactly twice in my life. Both unfortunate accidents where the bee and I collided.
I have long since lost count of how many times I have been stung by wasps just for being near them.
Bees don't make nests above my door, or under my patio awning. Or generally everywhere outside I need to be. Fuck them wasps.
I think we can all agree this fucker deserves some hate, though:

Is that the Japanese hornet that eats whole colonies of bees?
I cut down a tree yesterday for a few reasons. One was that these bastards were way too interested in it and it's right next to my house's door (the other was roots damaging the house as it grew bigger and blocking light in my window). I had one in the house the first year we moved here and that was not a fun experience.
Bees have never chased me down to sting me. Wasps however...
I've been chased by bees.
I once cut down a dead tree, not knowing that it contained a bees nest. They chased me until I jumped into a nearby creek. That was not fun.
The nest of meat-eating vulture bees:

Many wasp species are quite gentle. We get a lot of great golden digger wasps on our spotted bee balm and despite looking quite scary, they are quite gentle and avoid human contact.
We have a bird bath and when the water has evaporates, the blue mud dauber wasps will sit on the side and very patiently watch me refill it.
They eat parasites and protect the garden. Truly, the more the merrier.
Not many, majority. Only a few dozens species are asshole, and a handful of it is basically hell spawn. I have wasp often making nest near my garden, 0 sting, mostly because i live in tropical zone and in an area where asshole wasp isn't everywhere. The only wasp attack i've experienced so far is when i'm 10, where a wasp landed on my belly and i panicked swap it away, got stung that way.
Majority of wasp hater come from area where asshole wasp is around.
I'm a gardener and every time someone approaches my door to solicit pest management, I ask if it will kill the wasps and spiders. Every single time they share an excited yes, I get to tell them that I don't kill my gardening coworkers.
Wasps and spiders eat the bugs that eat my crops. Pesticides also greatly increase your risk of health issues. No thank you.
Once I listened to a pest control guy and he said "I bet you've noticed a lot of wolf spiders in your yard", to which I agreed.
He told me that their pest control dumps a shit load of pest control spray that should keep them away for a while. I asked, "but isn't that where they live? Outside?"
He didn't seem to understand how someone could belive that the spiders should be allowed to live outside.
Love that reply. Father of a friend paves every green spot in his property with stone floorings step by step for years now and sprays ant poison everywhere. He's really really pissed about them ants minding their own business (like... just normal ants, not even fire ants or smth).
My response is always a "the fucking audacity of those ants. Building their colony just right there in the ground outside! Don't they know this is your property?!"
... My comments on this topic are generally not very well received.
I'm usually surrounded by paper wasps who don't really seem to care unless you actively injure them. Have been bumped many times and they contonued on their way.
I've heard yellow jackets are usually the type to screw you over because they can.
(Un)fortunately, afaik yellow jackets are actually a pretty effective means of pest control for several crops because they more aggressively collect protein for their larvae.
because they more aggressively collect protein for their larvae.
Sorry, that's me offering them a small speck of meat so they leave the rest of my plate alone.
My dog got attacked by a colony of yellowjackets for having the audacity to go near their nest that was just on the other side of our fence line. He ended up in the ER for anaphylaxis. The neighbor's dogs got stung too, though they weren't allergic. Those little cunts can all die in a fire.
Paper wasps I hate less, I just wish they'd stop trying to make nests on the eaves of my house. They're chill, but I just want them to find somewhere else to call home.
There are 3D models available for paper wasp nests, that can stop them from latching to your house. Wasps are HIGHLY territorial, and will not start a new colony nearby to another nest.
I left an old one up by my garage, and despite it being empty, no wasps come remotely close to my the front of my house anymore.
For the record, soap kills insects. Get a good spray bottle, put a lot of soap in it, more than recommended online for me.
I genocided a ground wasp nest I stepped on some time back with the soap water, they don't make the connection between me and getting sprayed. I spent like three hours spraying countless wasps.
They jive around when sprayed, then maybe 12 seconds they go on their back convulsing, still within a minute.
One of them is chill and just zooms around to pollinate. The other tries to get into every place I don't want it to be violently and then starts stinging when it inevitably gets stuck. Wasps always try to get into my food, fly somewhere in my clothes where it'll inevitably get stuck, fly into my face, etc.
I've been stung multiple times by both. Bees was always my full idiocy (I was obsessed with insects as a kid). Wasps was never my fault though, those cunts just put themselves in harms way only to "defend themselves" when the inevitable happens
Put themselves in harms way only to get angry about their choices and “forced to defend themselves”… why does that sound so familiar
I've never understood their habit of nervously circling around my food for ages like some sort of pendulum of ruined picknicks. Why risk a fight when you could just get your food and fuck off? You'd think aeons of evolution would have corrected that. Sure, who doesn't like to take a sniff or two before digging in but wasps need to grow the fuck up.
I got stung by a wasp when I was a kid literally just for sitting in the backseat. I had done nothing at all, and I got stung like three times.
My favorite wasps are the wood-boring parasitoid varieties. Ovipositors twice as long as the rest of their bodies, and they drill holes in trees and logs to get to the grubs in the wood to lay an egg. They're incredibly chill to be around and tons of fun to watch while they work
Nothing personal against wasps. But I prefer them far away from me. Which often comes into conflict with their interests, as they have this nasty tendency to invade the space I occupy, as in my house, my patio, the places I have to go in order to work, etc. If they ignore me, I'll show the same respect. If stingers come out blazing, insecticide starts being sprayed.
The only time I've been stung by a bee is when I was little and walking outside bare foot and stepped on one. I've been stung by wasps for things like being outside or being inside when a wasp got in the house.
I've gotten stung by a dying wasp who crawled to my mousepad and I unknowingly placed my hand on it. Fuck those assholes
I get stung all the time. I mean not every year but maybe every other, but I work outside. If wasps nests are so sacrosanct and important, why do some species leave them laying on the ground?
Fuck Ground wasps. All stinging wasps are like mean drunks when it gets hot outside. Obviously there are thousands of other species, few of which sting.
Paper wasps are okay, they just want to eat rotting wood to make their nests. Fuuuuuuck eastern yellowjackets though. I'm pretty sure those assholes sting you on sight because they enjoy it. They make me glad that we also have bald-faced hornets to keep them in check.
I was driving down the motorway in shorts and I noticed a wasp on my leg. I felt like I was being held at gun point
Paper Wasps ✔️ Yellowjackets ❌
A paper wasp keeps trying to make a nest in my doorway and we look at each other every time I open the door. Since they're not aggressive they don't do anything unless you actively are messing with them (and sometimes even then they don't attack!)
Anyways, it flies away and I remove the beginnings of the nest every time. Then it comes back overnight and makes another one in the exact same spot. It's a little game I play with the wasp at this point
Paper wasps are such bros! A month or two ago I stuck my hand into one of their nests inadvertantly, was greeted with what felt like electrical shocks, and my hand didn't swell or even hurt after a minute or two.
I will always come to paper wasps', or wasps in general, defense. I'm sure yellow jackets play an important ecological niche too, but I haven't run into 'em enough to have an opinion on their temperament.
When the Interspecies Olympics finally get organized you'll both be ready!
Not only do they kill honeybees, they even attack each other. Wasp bed.
"Wasp bed" sounds like an inventive form of torture
Yeah but maybe if an invasive species didn't try to nest IN MY FUCKING LIGHT FIXTURES then we wouldn't be having this convo
I had more than that - a bunch of nests that didn't die over the winters in my house's attic when I bought it, behind the kneewalls. I must have killed thousands of wasps that summer. But then! They left their dirty wasp pheromones everywhere so wasps come back year after year trying to put new nests up. I have never had such a difficult relationship with an animal before. But that was before Argentine ants started attacking... fuck those bastards
The parasitic wasps can fuck right off. I worked in the southern I25 corridor of Colorado for a while and saw Tarantula Hawks. My first thought was that I had seen a humming bird the first time I saw one - they are that big. The poor little male tarantulas are just venturing for a end of life hookup and then they have to worry about being eaten alive by the spawn of these fuckers. Poor bastards.

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