The Wasp Invasion
For those people that really don’t like wasps and there’s quite a few of you, there’s no good news in this blog. We have just recently got called out to a report of wasps building a nest on the curtains of a house and it seems that this is the first sighting of the European Paper Wasp in the area.
Previously unseen by me, the paper wasp has been in Britian and especially the southeast for some years and now I’d expect what with hotter summers and warmer winters, that within a couple of years, these will be a regular pest.
Where does the European Paper Wasp come from and why is it here?
There are four types of European Paper Wasp and the most common one in our area is the Polistes dominula, to give its correct name, this wasp is one which you’re more likely to bump into whilst on holiday in Spain or one of the Greek Islands. The European Paper wasp has been recorded here in the UK right back to 2009 when they were first discovered up in Warwickshire, with the dominula being the most common one found in the Southeast.
With typical black and yellow markings, you can tell this wasp easily by its thin waist and bright orange antenna, its wings are much thinner than our common species and all in all, it looks slimmer than the usual wasps that you’re used to seeing.
This wasp is prevalent all over the southern European area and has become a problem in the USA, given the recent spells of hot weather coming up from North Africa, I would imagine it’s easy for many small insects to ride the winds and thermals, and this may explain why we’re seeing these wasps now.
Alternatively, being that they’ve lived here for the last 16 years the other school of thought is that they’ve just been successful and have spread further and further across the Southeast and its now time to see them. Are these going to become a regular pest to deal with I wonder?
The Common Wasp
The Paper Wasp
European Hornet
So, what is the European Paper Wasp?
These are a species of social wasps that live in relatively small colonies and build themselves a nest from wood pulp and saliva, we call them social wasps, but anyone Who’s had dealings with them will tell you that they are anything but social.
The paper wasp however, has a couple of tricks up its rather thin sleeves that others wasps don’t: they have two unique characteristic which are absent in the other types of wasps, and for them, a real game changer.
Firstly, rather than having a single Queen wasp who rules the colony from birth to death, instead, paper wasps have “foundresses” or, to put it simply, multiple Queens. One or more foundresses start the colony off with the dominant Queen being selected as the one that lays the most eggs.
The other foundresses become subservient but If anything happens to her and she dies, one of the subordinate females becomes the new dominant Queen, and so the colonies existence is guaranteed. This quirk doesn’t happen with other species, if the Queen wasp dies, then the colony will diminish and die off completely.
The second special characteristic of these wasps is that unlike our more familiar species like the common wasp which never return to an old nest, the paper wasp is happy to return and occupy an old nest. These old nests have been recorded as being in use for several years, and without having to spend time and energy foraging for building materials, the paper wasp has more time to go out and hunt insects and so increase wasp population faster than the others.
How can you tell if you have a paper wasp nest?
All the other species of wasp build large rounded nests, with a thick outer sheath to protect the inner area. The working part of the nest where the larvae are raised is the honeycomb section which are flat sections with the cell openings facing downwards, the paper wasp dispenses with building the outer sheath and just builds the honeycomb.
This is often attached to the undersides of plants and parts of buildings, they don’t build nests in voids or underground like other species do.
Like all wasps, they carry venom and the sting from the European Paper Wasp is going to hurt, as hotter summers in Maidenhead become more and more frequent and the winters become milder, the chances of coming across these wasps becomes greater.
I have noticed when treating wasp nests, on those hot, sunny days the reaction ramps up extremely quickly and they become more aggressive in better weather, certainly I need to wear my PPE more these days than a few years ago. With a definite risk of getting stung and getting multiple stings if things go wrong, tackling a wasp nest should be left to experienced professionals. Why risk a DIY treatment?
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