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PostPosted: Sun Jan 04, 2004 9:00 pm 
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I read where the black wasps are beneficial. Would you please explain how?

Also, we just discovered about 9 black wasps' nests inside our garage, inside one of our receding light fixtures. This light fixture stopped working during the summer. There are 2 large mounds of dirt nests wrapped around the electrical wiring! How can we rid these pests from returning?

Thanks


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PostPosted: Mon Jan 05, 2004 10:06 am 
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Mud dauber wasps are beneficial because they feed black widow and brown recluse spiders to their young. If you have a bunch of mud dauber wasps this year, you might not have any next year. They seem to go in cycles as they gain control of the spiders. The scary thing for me is not the wasps but the large number of spiders they must be eating.

Paper wasps, if you are lucky to have them, eat caterpillars. They are better than birds for taking care of caterpillars because birds quite often eat fruit and veggies growing in the garden.

Smaller wasps are also beneficial but you don't see them at work. It is my belief that every time you spray insecticide over any area at all, you are killing some kind of beneficial wasp that you can't see.

Wasps are extremely social and tame unless you start swinging your arms around swatting at them - or if you accidentally bump into a nest. But other than that, they learn your habits and leave you alone. I have been sharing my garage office with wasps for several years without incident. My 5-year-old daughter accidentally stirred up a wasps' nest on my boat (in storage) last summer and got stung several times. It took a couple of days for her to relax about them but she's back to normal. Now when she sees a wasp she ignores it.

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