Stinging Insect Control

There are many native species of yellowjackets in Ohio, but the dominant species is the German yellowjacket. They often make their nests within wall voids. There can be 5,000 adults inside a mature colony. Yellowjackets are more than just a nuisance, and can create huge issues for homeowners and businesses. In fact, most of the calls we receive for stinging insect control are in regards to German yellowjacket nests.

Yellowjacket season in Cleveland, OH runs from July – October. They remain relatively unnoticed until then. In late summer and autumn, the yellowjacket’s diet changes from proteins to carbohydrates. That’s why you’ll often spot them dive-bombing your Labor Day picnic. Their insatiable taste for sweets turns them into a formidable threat to outdoor living. Keep an extra close eye on your pop can during this time — there’s little worse than going for a swig and kissing yellowjacket tail instead!

How to Control Yellowjackets

You will unfortunately find yellowjacket nests in the ground, in logs, or in the walls of your home. Most yellowjacket nests are in inaccessible areas. This protects them from predators. It can be under a shrub, in a chipmunk burrow, a compost pile, stacks of firewood, landscape timbers, or your walls. The list goes on.

Retail wasp and hornet sprays only work if you hit the nest with the spray. Since they hide their nests deep in cavities, the cans sold at stores do not usually work. They agitate the colony. If the colony is inside your walls, yellowjackets can start coming inside. You do not want this to happen.

Luckily, our Cleveland bee and wasp exterminators have products categorized as non-repellents. These products will not agitate the colony. You will still want to stay away from the area for the rest of the day. But our treatments are fast and effective. It is like a stealth killer- way better than anything you can do yourself!

Paper wasps are generally less aggressive than yellowjackets. During springtime, you’ll frequently notice them emerging from hibernation in attic spaces. Our office receives a number of stinging insect control calls when paper wasps start to swarm about rooftops. After their post-hibernation celebration, native paper wasps usually blend back into nature. You may never see a native paper wasp up close unless you find yourself in a meadow.

The European paper wasp gives other paper wasp species a bad wrap. They are much more aggressive than other species. European paper wasps have black and yellow coloration and look a lot like yellowjackets. Paper wasps, however, have longer legs. These pests build open comb nests in fences, sign posts, exterior light fixtures, playground equipment, and window frames.

How to Control Paper Wasps

European paper wasp often build their nests in easily-accessible areas, making them a cinch to remove. During the spring, we dust higher elevations to stop their rooftop swarms. We use a telescopic pole with an attached duster to apply products.

Unlike honeybees, bald-faced hornets can sting their victims repeatedly. Take it from us — it is bloody painful to get wrapped up in their onslaught. It goes without saying that not many people enjoy discovering their basketball-sized nests in their yard!

The funny thing about bald-faced hornets is that their nests are rarely noticed until after the leaves fall in Autumn. People stare in disbelief at huge nests dangling off low-hanging branches on their lawns. How did they survive cutting the grass there all summer long? They risked an onslaught of stings and, without a doubt, a trip to the emergency room every time they mowed the lawn. Yet most people escape this fate. Bald-faced hornets are high-risk, low-probability pest!

Controlling Bald-Faced Hornets

We dump a healthy serving of wasp and hornet spray into the entry hole of bald faced hornet nests. Once activity ceases, we cut the nest down, bag it up and remove it from site.

Mud daubers are prolific stinging pests in Cleveland, OH. While they don’t usually sting humans, they’re often considered pests due to their activity in and around the home. Lots of people see them buzzing around in high numbers, but are unsure where the nest is. There are three kinds of mud daubers in Cleveland, OH: the yellow-and-black mud dauber, the organ pipe mud dauber, and the blue mud dauber. All are solitary stinging insects.

These mission-oriented predators go around collecting spiders and mud. They use their stingers to paralyze the spiders and entomb them in a mud gallery, along with one of their eggs. Once the egg hatches, the larva feeds on the living, yet still-paralyzed spider. After dinner, the mud dauber larva pupates within the mud nest. Finally, it emerges as an adult mud dauber.

Homes are great spots to build mud nests. If you have evergreen bushes with lots of spiders, and an irrigation system, mud daubers will love your house. They are most troublesome when located in window frames or in soffits. Emerging adults often venture inside instead of out.

How to Control Mud Daubers

Mud nests can easily be removed with a scraper tool. We work with the customer to implement cultural controls. You can eliminate these pests from your area by applying mulch to exposed soil and cutting back on irrigation. Our service often involves treating the perimeter of the home for spiders. Just like paper wasps, mud daubers are most active around the roofs of homes. To stop heavy mud dauber activity, we use extension bee poles to dust any crevice showing activity.

Carpenter bees are important pollinators. Nonetheless, they can also be very destructive to a home. They bore into porch ceilings, cedar siding, arbors, and trim — basically anywhere with a shoddy paint job. If you have carpenter bees, it probably means you need to paint or stain certain parts of your home. You can deter carpenter bees from nesting by covering any exposed wood with a thick coat of paint. The bees simply cannot chew their way through a well-painted wood surface. Porch ceilings are prime nesting spots because they are often stained instead of painted. They also find places that are not painted at all, like the underside of porch railings. People with cedar trim or cedar shake get hit with carpenter bees the worst. To add insult to injury, the real damage comes when woodpeckers retrieve the larvae from inside the wood.

How to Control Carpenter Bees

Long-term carpenter bee control entails treating the effected wood with fresh paint or stain. Because carpenter bees are pollinators, removing certain flowering plants may also be a valid option. Our treatment involves dusting or foaming galleries. Because caulk is difficult for them to chew through, caulking is a great way to fill in any damage from nesting activities, and can prevent future nests. It’s best to leave the treated holes exposed for a few days before you caulk, though. That way, any bee that was not in the nest during treatment will have a chance to come into contact with the applied product. If entry points are sealed prematurely, carpenter bees might return to the site and cause further damage.