After the dry weather arrived, the paper wasps built their nests in open, uncovered places that they’d never risked in the La Niña years, and he didn’t see them coming.
At least, not until he walked into the covered part of his vegetable garden, and they sprung from a new nest just inside the gate and whacked him.
I’ve learned over the years that he doesn’t like surprises very much — but the wasps didn’t know that. Besides, he was too close to their nest, which was hanging off a horizontal iron pipe — and when you get too close to their nest is when they attack.
Not only did they surprise him but they hurt him, and he didn’t take it well. Minutes later, he returned from the garage with a can of Hovex and 40 paper wasps expired.
It was the beginning of a sustained wasp-thinning campaign, and it’s been testing his commitment to the balance of nature and the sanctity of all living creatures.
He leaves them alone in the garden because he reckons they do a good job eating bugs and grubs and mites, but they are pesky around the house because of the way they defend their nests. With some chilly mornings lately, he’s been out early, spraying the nests under the eaves so they don’t get ahead of him in the spring.
Over winter, he’ll scrape off all the mud wasp nests too, where the females have left caterpillars and grubs for their larvae to feed on. These mud wasps are the larger, more solitary ones with the big orange stinger, but they also eat the spiders and bugs around the garden and The Boss says they are easier to get on with — in modest numbers, anyway.
He’s grateful we don’t have too many European wasps around here yet — they are much more aggressive than the native varieties and are spreading steadily as the climate warms up. A cold, frosty winter is needed to keep their numbers down, and winters like that are getting scarcer.
On the Goulburn below Eildon, the trout fishermen have noticed how the European wasps have attacked the willow grubs, which used to be favoured fish food in autumn — and campers over Easter were complaining about them being a nuisance along the King and Ovens rivers.
The Boss says the European wasp arrived first in Tasmania back in 1959, and fishermen on the central plateau there are convinced they have changed the ecology in the Tasmanian bush, decimating species such as the gum beetle and other terrestrial insects crucial to the food chain.
The European wasps mainly nest underground and can have several thousand wasps in a nest, coming and going through a single hole. They fly with their legs tucked up, whereas our native wasps have their legs dangling — that’s how to spot the difference.
These bright black and yellow wasps are a particular nuisance in urban areas because they are scavengers, attracted to food and sweet drinks. Their nests aren’t easy to find either, so the best strategy is to attract them to a trap, then poison them.
I’m happy for The Boss to try to keep them all at bay. A dog only eats one wasp in his life — and treats them warily for ever after. Woof!
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