Against carpenter bees. They are a real problem in the South, boring holes in your roof joists, facia boards, and eaves. So, I tried some traps. Built six. We will see how they work.
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Danny,
After working on the kiln, and sawing walnut this weekend, I noticed a few buzzing around my kiln and drying shed. If you see that those traps are working, let me know, cause I'll need about 100 of them. The bees ate all the rough cedar facias on the house in Orange, and that will not happen here too!!! Andy :rifle: :rifle: :rifle:
PB blaster drops them out of the sky. i dont know how or why it works but my dad turns in to a 9 year old boy who just got a BB gun when he has that can of pb blaster. also you can spray it into their hole and they will back out fall and die.
for the traps, i dont remember seeing any of those bees in his traps but plenty of wasps and flys.
good luck
Darn pests. If it ain't one thing it's another.
Need any snow to slow them down some? You could load some on your no snow load roof. ;D
Yes, the traps work. I thought that I had pictures, but apparently not. :-\
Danny, I built several of those and hung em under the rafters where they were active and never caught a single one. I called Bowtie (I copied his traps) to report my lack of success and his reply was that Oklahoma wood bees must be smarter than Alabama wood bees!
I wish you luck. I see your pallets, I make them too for my wood, But I nail a sticking to them to get the wood off the pallet. Every 2' and stick the lumber right above them. :)
Take your pick,
The Glaciered North,
or carpenter bees.
Can't have both.
Are these the type that nest in the ground? My brother had them eating his porch railing years ago. He saw where the entrance to their nest in the ground was. At dusk one night, (when they had retired for the evening) he put a funnel in the hole, poured in some ammonia, and then, STANDING UP WIND, he poured in some bleach. smiley_devil
Problem solved.
I made some of those and had fairly good results with them. The carpenter bees were boring into the soffits of my house that were sheaved in BC plywood. They were also putting divots in the cypress siding on the house.
They went away and quit bothering the house, I think because I started using the indoor wood furnace
which sort of bathed the house in wood smoke after a whole winter of use. I don't think the house smelled right to them.
I bet the traps would work better with some fresh pine chips in them.
Jack,
These nest in the wood, boring long tunnels and chambers.
I will take the bees. Y'all keep the glaciers.
Good luck general ,let us know how they work.
I settled my carpenter bee war last year. After making traps, coating my house in pesticides, and heavy tennis racket use (swatting), I bought some citronella stuff off the internet from a log home site. You can mix it with stain or just apply it with a pump up sprayer. The bees leave that stuff alone. Within a few days, all was calm around the homestead. Its pretty smelly the first few days but the smell wears off in a couple weeks. Im anxious to see if they come back this spring or I got them for good. The seven bug spray that you hook to your garden hose works pretty good too but I made myself sick spraying it up on the eaves. :-\
PB blaster works dang good!
When ammo was cheaper I sat with a .22 pistol waiting for them to fly by so I could play anti aircraft gunner or anti bee gunner. Got 17 in one day like that.
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Bill,
Ever shoot your building by mistake?
You know eating lots of cheese will improve your marksmanship.
Pete
You find a perfectly round hole in the soffit .Insert a 16 penny nail,it buzzs real load until the nail takes effect .Works but after the fact .
My house has fletch cut cedar gables .The peckerwoods liked to chop holes in it the bees in other portions .Got some woodpecker resistant paint from Sherwin Williams.
It must have dulled the woodpeckers pecker and tasted bad to the bee .Peckerless and beeless as I type .
WDH, did you find that idea on the net or did you come up with this nice looking gizmo and how does it work.
We get plenty of them up here. They just slow down a little during our glacierization phase. I was ripping stickers out of some ewp boards we had stickered out behind the shop. It was during cold weather, and one of the stickers had a bore hole parallel to the saw cut. There were four of those guys riding out the glacier in there. I didn't inspect them closely, but they must have gotten a close shave on one side. :D
Yep, I got my tennis racket out yesterday. bat_smailey
This cool snap ought to calm them down for a few days here.
I'm thinking beedmitten. ;D
OK guys! Let me tell y'all how the U.S. Forest Service does it in certain districts on some historical structures, out buildings, restrooms and pump houses, etc. After managing several districts for the forest service for almost 15 years through a special use permit, we would mix 1/2 boiled linseed oil, and 1/2 thinner in a pump sprayer and apply thoroughly to all exposed surfaces. Historical buildings are part of our national treasures, so the preservation of these buildings is a must. No bees will attack, bore, or lay their eggs in these old buildings. The photos are just a few of the buildings that were treated with this mixture. Hope this will help!
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I have made some of these traps and they work great! I made 4 of em and only 2 worked.. found out that they will not touch wet wood. I had made 2 out of fresh cut pine, they didn't have any bees in bottles although the dry wood traps were half filled!
Also I found that if you "bait" them with a live bee it surely increases your chances of it working. I usually use a shuttle cock racket and disable one and put him in the bottle. Seems to work, they must give off a scent or something.
Mikey
Quote from: Bert on March 24, 2014, 09:05:54 AM
I bought some citronella stuff off the internet from a log home site. You can mix it with stain or just apply it with a pump up sprayer. The bees leave that stuff alone.
And when the house catches on fire from all the chemicals you sprayed on it, the Citronella does a good job of keeping the Skeeters away. :D
Quote from: giant splinter on March 24, 2014, 10:59:36 AM
WDH, did you find that idea on the net or did you come up with this nice looking gizmo and how does it work.
Giant,
Found it on the Internet.
QuoteAnd when the house catches on fire from all the chemicals you sprayed on it, the Citronella does a good job of keeping the Skeeters away.
But at least I won the bee war... right? smiley_thumbsup
Kinda like shooting snakes in the house. There is reciprocal damage.
We don't seem to have carpenter bees here. Our bumble bees will nest in a wall of a building though, but don't chew wood. For that we have carpenter ants. ;D I've never seen them attack hard sound wood though, just bad sills and dry rot.
Traps won't kill the queen, she stays in the nest in the woods.
Phosgene gas baby! smiley_devil
The woodpeckers hear the larvae and tear out the wood until they get them. They do a lot of damage. Got 15 yesterday with bad mitten racket and dad got 12. The traps {from what I have studied} need to be stable where they won't swing and put on the sides of the building with the most sunlight The biggest thing is that the hole has to be drilled at an angle {to prevent water from entering}. Once infested they come back to the same place the next year. You tube has an older gentleman who shows how to make them. I hate these things. Several years ago I had to tear down my whole shed because they did so much damage, and then the woodpeckers would hang upside down and sound like a machine gun at daylight trying to get them. Hope you win the war.
We bought an electric bug zapper that looks like a tennis racket only cost a few bucks. Push the button on the handle and when you swing it zaps most any bug pretty good (just dont hit yourself or anyone next to ya don't ask how I know ::)) We have two of em at the property in the UP. We keep one near by whenever we are sitting outside relaxing..
I have several of the traps on my house and they seem to work pretty good. The more bees in them the better they seem to work, so I don't empty mine.
That makes sense, a good measure of success. ;D
Haven't caught any yet :).
Those Georgia bees may be smarter than the Alabama bees!
I fought a battle in this war yesterday, but emerged victorious. ;D
A few days ago, one of Linda's cats caught a carpenter bee that was buzzing against the window in the den. I wasn't surprised, since she leaves the door open for the cats to come and go sometimes. Next day, the same cat caught another one in the same window. Yesterday, she caught another one, then another and another, all in the same place. It turns out that this window is the one right beside my firewood rack. In it, I found a big chunk of Devilwood(Pecan) with several large galleries where the bees were hatching out or emerging from hibernation, not sure which. I declared fireplace season to be officially over at that point and removed all firewood from in and around the house. :snowball:
DanG,
Sounds like time to have a BBQ using that firewood!
I'm sure the extra protean in the smoke would add an interesting flavor...
Herb
Been thinking about using it to smoke a housecat, Herb. ;) :D :D
Wild Bill and I are in Tenn. We got a bunch of them here getting behind the cedar shake wall. Been spraying them as I see one. Can't afford the .22 ammo to shoot them this year.
I have only caught about 10, but there are not as many around this year so far for some reason.
For sure there is 10 less than last year. ;D
And I still haven't caught a single one!
I have enough for both of us so don't worry about your numbers going down.
They are not going extinct, that is for sure.
I spray the eaves or whatever they are boring into with malathion and or diazanon. the next day there is a whole pile of them laying out there.
badmitton rackets. we were running out of boring bees to get with the rackets. if you twack them hard enough you cut them in half
It seems like they are worse around my barn than ever.
I hate to kill them but I'd hate it worse if my barn fell down... again.
Time to build an all stone exterior home down there where those bees are.
I'd take those carpenter bees over yellow jackets or bald faced hornets.
Quote from: CJennings on April 21, 2015, 03:29:43 PM
Time to build an all stone exterior home down there where those bees are.
I'd take those carpenter bees over yellow jackets or bald faced hornets.
I'm weird.. I'm happy we don't have the carpenter bees... and I'm okay with having yellow jackets and bald faced hornets.
I don't bother them, they don't bother me. But sounds like the carpenter bees eat a lot of wood, which
would bother me. ;D
The yellow jackets just seem to love the eaves of my home, so by mid-summer it's quite an "adventure" coming and going. It doesn't seem to matter how many times you kill them and destroy the nests, more fill in.
Those might be wasps instead of yellow jackets.
Wasps have the hanging honeycomb-like circular nest. Not as mean as a yellow jacket. ;)
Yellow jackets den in the ground or around an ole stump down here. Banjo