As the weather warms up and we start planning for pool days and summer vacations and dragging the barbeques and lawn furniture out of storage, wasps start to become a concern. Wasps are one of the most common summer pests, but that doesn’t mean you want to have to deal with them. Can you prevent wasps from building a nest on your property? Or are you doomed to live in fear of the ominous bzzz every time you step foot outside your home?
Fortunately, there are steps you can take in order to prevent wasps from encroaching upon your territory. Here’s what you need to know about the common types of wasps here in Northern Utah, why wasps even want to build a nest on your property in the first place, and what you can do to prevent wasps. If you’ve already discovered wasps on your property, you’ll want to contact a pest control expert to come out and resolve the problem and keep the stingers from coming back.
Common Types Of Wasps In Utah
There are over 4000 different types of wasps in the United States, according to the National Pest Management Association (NPMA). Some are more aggressive than others, but wasps, like all things, have a purpose. They can help control other pests around your garden and pollinate plants. However, they do sting, and those stings can cause allergic reactions that can end up sending you to the emergency room. As such, it’s no wonder that people want to prevent wasps from making your home theirs.
Some of the common types of wasps we see here in Northern Utah include:
- Yellow jackets
- Paper wasps
- Mud dauber wasps
- Hornets
Why Wasps Claim Your Home For Their Own
In order to know how to prevent wasps, it’s important to understand what attracts them to your home in the first place. Wasps seek out protection, food, and somewhere with plenty of materials they can use to build their nests with. Your house gives wasps a space away from predators, provides them with plenty of food supplies – such as exposed sodas and ant hills and more, and no shortage of building materials, like your damaged siding or your old wooden fence or that tree with the rotting bark in the backyard.
How To Prevent Wasps
The last thing you want is to have to worry about wasps ruining your summer barbeques or time outside. In order to properly prevent wasps, you want to start your wasp control measures as early as you can, for optimal effectiveness.
Some of the ways in which you can prevent wasps include:
- Sealing garbage cans and covering compost piles. Wasps will eat all kinds of foods, including what’s rotting in your garbage. They’ll be attracted to any food waste in your garbage or compost, as well as anything with protein or that is sugary.
- Picking up trash around your property. This also attracts wasps. Whenever you have a barbeque or simply a snack outside, make sure that you don’t leave your trash out.
- Remove any food sources from around your home. This doesn’t just mean leftovers, but also, any rotten fruit that’s fallen from a tree, as well as bird feeders and pet food.
- Patch up cracks and crevices. Wasps look for hollow spaces to build their nests in, so to help prevent wasps, make sure that you seal any cracks and crevices around your property.
- Use natural scents that wasps are repelled by. Some plants naturally prevent wasps, such as peppermint, spearmint, thyme, citronella, wormwood, eucalyptus, and more.
- Check for nests. The sooner you find a wasp nest, the sooner it can be treated before it gets the chance to grow and become a more significant problem.
Why You Shouldn’t DIY Wasp Removal
Technically, you can try to DIY whatever you like, but that doesn’t mean that you should or that it’s a good idea for you to. Wasp removal is one such case. Wasps can be very aggressive, and those stings hurt! You don’t want to end up in the emergency room because you didn’t have the appropriate tools or equipment to treat the wasp nests around your property. If you try to knock down a nest, they could very well swarm you, causing just that to happen.
Wasp removal is best left to experienced professionals who have the safety equipment, tools, and training needed to properly remove your wasp problem and prevent wasps from coming back.
Do You Have Wasps On Your Property?
Onyx Lawn & Pest Control provides professional wasp control services. If you have wasps on your property, contact us! We’ll treat the nests and keep them from coming back.
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