Wasps in a high traffic area are definitely bad, but if the nest is somewhere not too in the way I'd encourage folks to leave it be. Wasps are predators, and they eat a lot of the bugs that damage gardens. Yes, they are also assholes, do you have to strike a balance, but they can be really beneficial.
Obviously, if you've got young kids around or the wasps are being aggressive, take care of the humans first, but understanding them a bit can really reduce the conflict with them.
I’m fine with your garden variety paper wasp, along with its European counterpart [0] that is all over the US and closely resembles a yellow jacket, but the latter tucks its legs in flight while the former doesn’t, which makes distinguishing the two relatively easy. Paper wasps generally aren’t aggressive unless you’re in their business, and they’re easy to deal with if you have to.
Yellow jackets are a different story entirely. Sometimes they nest underground which can be a real problem (mowing/lawncare, pets, children), and they are far more aggressive than paper wasps and hornets. The sting is quite a bit worse than either, too, so my philosophy is if I find a nest in the spring it’s given no quarter with no remorse.
A tablespoon or two of carbaryl dust dumped right at the main entrance hole (at night, of course, and use a red headlamp light etc., nothing bright) will put the hurt on. They carry the dust inside the nest and get it all over the place, but it doesn’t alarm them like spray cans of insecticide do.
Wait a couple days to see activity die down, might need another application. Eventually the queen will die which will kill the colony. Any stragglers can be handled with spray cans.
There are some YouTube videos [0] that show the idea of using carbaryl dust that might be helpful. An insecticide dust applicator would be the perfect thing to use, but all I did was slowly march up to the hole and dump the dust from a cup right onto it.
When we were kids we used to catch wasps in a plastic cup, put them in the freezer until they were anesthetized, and then tie a little leash on them with sewing thread.
Then you chase your friends around the neighborhood with your personal attack wasp. Good times.
I fried them in a piece of glass tube from a neon sign, with the high voltage wires from the transformer poked into the opposing ends of the tube until it started to arc from wire to wire through the wasp. Stank.
I'm neither proud nor ashamed. Today in my more boring older age I just grab whatever random inappropriate houshold or automotive chemical is handy that squirts or sprays.
Soapy water (dish soap) in a spray bottle works wonders. Once they are wet and bubbly they can’t fly, making it safe to knock them to the ground and squish them.
If you happen to have the spray bottle in hand while they are flying at you, a quick mist in the air in their flight path will turn them away.
Slightly tangential but this was a learning moment for me.
This reminds me of a story where Sage Mandavya established the first juvenile law in Hindu mythology.
<story starts>
Long ago, there lived a great sage named Mandavya who had taken a vow of silence and spent his days in deep meditation. One day, while he sat motionless beneath a tree with his arms raised in penance, a group of thieves being pursued by the king’s soldiers fled into his hermitage. They hid their stolen loot near the sage and escaped through the other side.
When the king’s soldiers arrived, they found the stolen goods but the sage—deep in meditation and bound by his vow of silence—neither confirmed nor denied their presence. The soldiers arrested him and brought him before the king, accusing him of harboring criminals.
Despite his spiritual stature, the king ordered a severe punishment: Mandavya was to be impaled on a stake (shula)—a horrific execution where a wooden spike was driven through the body. However, due to his immense yogic powers and detachment from the physical world, the sage did not die. He remained alive on the stake, enduring the agony with superhuman patience.
Eventually, other sages intervened, the king realized his grave error, and Mandavya was freed. But the damage was done. When the sage finally left his mortal body, he went directly to Yamaloka—the realm of Yama, the god of death and justice—to demand an explanation.
“Why did I have to suffer such a gruesome fate?” Sage Mandavya asked Lord Yama. “What terrible sin did I commit to deserve impalement?”
Yama consulted his records and replied, “When you were a child, you caught a dragonfly and pierced it with a needle through its body, watching it suffer for your amusement. That act of cruelty resulted in your punishment - you experienced the same suffering you inflicted on that innocent creature.”
Sage Mandavya was furious. “That was when I was a child!” he protested. “I was too young to understand the difference between right and wrong, between sin and virtue. How can you punish an ignorant child with the same severity as a knowing adult?”
Yama tried to explain that karma operates impartially, but Mandavya would not accept this. In his righteous anger, the sage cursed Yama himself: “For this unjust judgment, you shall be born as a human on Earth and experience mortality yourself!”
This curse led to Yama being born as Vidura, the wise and virtuous counselor in the Mahabharata - a human who, despite his wisdom and righteousness, had to endure the limitations and sufferings of mortal life.
But Mandavya didn’t stop there. Using his spiritual authority, he proclaimed a new divine law: “No sin committed by a child below the age of fourteen shall count toward their karmic debt equivalent to that of an adult. Children who do not yet understand dharma and adharma shall not be punished for their ignorant actions.”
This became the first “juvenile law” in Hindu mythology—a recognition that children, in their innocence and ignorance, deserve compassion and correction rather than severe punishment.
<story ends>
When I was a child, I too wanted to catch a dragonfly and tie a thread to it so it would fly around like a little pet. But my mother stopped me. She told me this very story of Sage Mandavya, and it scared me for life. I never forgot it, and I never tried to catch and bind a dragonfly again.
1. If is were possible for an ordinary mortal to impose arbitrary curses on the god of death and justice, the world would quickly descend into utter chaos.
2. If children are completely free from accountability, adults will form them into an army and convince them to commit crimes on their behalf, leading to an intolerable situation. This may already be a standard way of doing business in some parts of the world.
> If children are completely free from accountability, adults will form them into an army and convince them to commit crimes on their behalf, leading to an intolerable situation. This may already be a standard way of doing business in some parts of the world.
This is an ongoing problem in Norway now and I think it has been in Sweden for some time.
If you want to read more, search for the foxtrot network.
> 1. If is were possible for an ordinary mortal to impose arbitrary curses on the god of death and justice, the world would quickly descend into utter chaos.
Mandavya is not just any mortal; he is an enlightened sage. In Hinduism, enlightened beings are considered superior to gods. There’s another story about Sage Markandeya (one of the nine immortals, the Chiranjeevis) who caused the death of Yama, the God of Death. In Hindu cosmology, all the gods hold honorary responsibilities, and nothing is permanent - not even the position of Brahma, the Creator
> 2. If children are completely free from accountability, adults will form them into an army and convince them to commit crimes on their behalf, leading to an intolerable situation. This may already be a standard way of doing business in some parts of the world
I believe he introduced a juvenile law, which involves reduced sentences or milder punishments rather than granting complete immunity from consequences.
> 1. If is were possible for an ordinary mortal to impose arbitrary curses on the god of death and justice, the world would quickly descend into utter chaos.
Opportunity myth? Mortals are simply temporarily embarrassed gods?
I used to want to kill them all, regardless of where they were, until I watched this excellent SciShow video[0] titled "What If We Killed All the Wasps?". (but ticks can still go fuck themselves to death)
Very much this. After multiple very painful stings, I have a zero tolerance policy for nests on the house, but I am very grateful when they show up in the garden. Wasps are more effective at controlling garden pests than any chemical means I've tried. Plus they seem to be the only pollinators of my passionfruit.
Around here the passion flowers are mostly pollinated by a species of bumblebee with an almost-all-black abdomen and beautiful violet wings. So far they haven't stung me, although I'm sure they could, and it would be very painful. I haven't tried capturing them.
When the crusader army reached Béziers, they demanded that all heretics be handed over. The townspeople refused, and the crusaders stormed the city. Once inside, they couldn’t tell Catholics from Cathars—everyone spoke the same language and lived side by side.
That’s when the Cistercian legate Arnaud Amalric supposedly gave his infamous order:
“Caedite eos; Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius.”
“Kill them all; for the Lord knows those that are His.”
It’s a paraphrase of 2 Timothy 2:19 (“The Lord knoweth them that are his”).
The crusaders slaughtered virtually the entire population—estimated between 10,000 – 20,000 people—before burning the city.
Obviously, if you've got young kids around or the wasps are being aggressive, take care of the humans first, but understanding them a bit can really reduce the conflict with them.