Opus 2018-119: Firsts: Eco-Wasping

This was not the first time I have attacked the wasps around our house.  It was the first time I did it without insecticides. 

We are out in the country.  Wasps have a place in the food chain and I accept that.  However, there place is not on my porch or in my living room.  If I never got buzzed I would be willing to let them live in the brush around my house.  I generally don’t mess with spiders if they stay outside.  If I could communicate I would tell them that but they don’t seem to want to listen.

I have used different sprays and they work well.  I have no complaints on that but I begin to wonder about the possible build up of toxic chemicals.  As an old man I figured I could out live the results but now I am a grandparent and things look different.

So I went on line and looked for alternatives.  One that I kept seeing was a simple solution of dishwashing soap and water.  If you want to get fancy you can add some peppermint oil.  In all the videos the wasps would drop fast enough that I would not need to worry about revenge.  One guy was spraying the wasps inside a small greenhouse with no special clothes and his son playing around his feet.

I gave it a try.  I went out around dawn.  The wasps are supposed to be sleeping in at that point.  I had found a series of new nests the day before and had plenty of targets.  I hit the first one and some of them literally dropped like rocks immediately.  Others struggled for a bit but did not know what hit them.  I tried a second nest and one managed to fly away so I decided I would retreat while still enjoying the flush of victory.  Later I will check to see the results and knock down the residue.

Why the peppermint?  They say that peppermint and water by itself will kill the larvae but the main reason was that wasps don’t like the smell and it will keep them from coming back. 

Now I have to deal with my wife asking, “What happened to all my dish soap?”

homo unius libri