Beginning of a wasp nest? Advice please.

bobbyss

Noticed some traffic of small wasps low down beside kind of broken sewer last few days. They are not fully developed yet. I can't locate a specific place of entry to anywhere. Some are landing on ledge, some settling on a blade of grass. Almost as if they are not in a particular hurry to go anywhere.

I also noticed in the past few days what I thought were small fluffs of tiny feathers floating around. Today these looked like tiny wasp like flyers???

I always assumed wasps would nest high up in gutters so I can't really understand what's happening. They are located just beside the back door so will be a problem later on.

I put some washing up powder around the back door as some (as I said) seem to settle on the grass and surfaces.

What should I do at this stage? As of yet I can't locate where they are going exactly but am presuming a nest is being built. And those feathery things? Are they baby wasps as they certainly look like them.
What to do?

_Brian

Wonder if you rinse the area with jeys fluid would that deter them.

Otherwise wait until something obvious appears and destroy it then.

New Home

Would you be able to post a picture, please? It might help identify those "feathery" things you mention (I doubt they'd be baby wasps, but I'm curious).

bobbyss

New Home wrote:

Would you be able to post a picture, please? It might help identify those "feathery" things you mention (I doubt they'd be baby wasps, but I'm curious).

Unfortunately I'm not that good with technology to post a picture. Maybe feathery is wrong. In fact it is wrong. They are the smallest of flying insects that look to be like a wasp that are a few days old. No noise. No threat. Just kind of floating/flying around but at this stage not in any great numbers.

As if happens I just put washing powder down on back tarmac area to get rid of moss and a good job it did too. That's why I decided to put down some around where they seem to hover and land in the hope that they will bring this with them inside the nest. I know the solution will be the professionals but at this early stage as the nest still seems to be developing what I myself can do to get rid. As I said, it's just at back door at ground level close to a broken sewer. A place I didn't expect wasps to be interested in.

New Home

They could be some sort of hoverfly. If they are, they're completely harmless.

https://www.google.com/search?q=hoverfly&client=firefox-b-d&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwinno_Su9ThAhUF2KQKHfeYBpEQ_AUIDigB&biw=1366&bih=645

bobbyss

New Home wrote:

They could be some sort of hoverfly. If they are, they're completely harmless.

Thanks for that. Food for thought. I will have to have a rethink about this. They are rather strange wasps if that is what they are. I'm assuming they are young wasps. But after looking at that link you sent I am going to have a rethink.

There are not th5st many at the moment.
As mentioned earlier some are just landing on cement paving and one or two settling on clump of grass. I don't often see real wasps do that. Also if a wasp is flying about these days would it not already be fully grown and would give you a kind of threat? These lads are not giving me a feeling of a threat so far and they look remarkably like the hoverfly in the link. They look remarkably like what I thought a young wasp would look like except they don't have that distinctive yellowness that wasps have.

New Home

TBH, without a picture it's hard to tell. Wasps are generally ok unless you disturb them, but then again I'm not afraid of them (perhaps I should! :P).

New Home

If they're all black (or black with a deep green tinge) they could be soldier flies, too, and if they are they're extremely beneficial, especially if you've a compost bin or a compost heap.

mikep

Even if they are wasps do you need to get rid of them?

Very handy in the garden to eat greenfly etc..

I've a few nests around the garden and I tend to leave them alone unless they are somewhere where I am likely to piss them off..i.e the boiler house..I'll get rid of them from there..

blackbox

Wasps (like most insects) do not get bigger as they get older.

You probably have hoverflies (good for eating greenfly) or some native bees.

In either case I'd leave them alone.

lordgoat

Google life cycle of the wasp and have a look at the images. They look like a wasp pretty much at all times.