@@CaptainWingnut Hello Shelley. I appreciate your wise videos very much. Can you tell me how to find the spider video? I am a technical dinosaur and can’t find what the story board is to locate it. Thank you 👍👏👏
Thank You Sir. The old ways are usually the best. My sons have learned that dad may not be able to pass on a wealth of money, but my wealth of knowledge is far more valuable.
Thank you! I used the soda can boric acid.... first the wasps showed up and we're gone 2 weeks later....then yellow jackets gone after 10 days... now hornets are dying off after about 10 days. THIS STUFF WORKS!!!!!! A thousand times thank you!!!!
I know this is quite old.. 4 years now. But I still wanted to thank you, going to try this up at our cabin in a couple weeks when we go open it. We have ground wasps up there, last summer I was swarmed and stung repeatedly all over… from my toes to my face over a dozen times. It was soooo painful! It ruined the rest of my summer up there, was too afraid to sit on the deck or go down to the lake, they were everywhere. My pup was stung several times too. 😢 I sure pray this works! 🙏🏼
Great tip. I live in the Ozark mountains and about 9 years ago was viciously attacked by yellow jackets. The folks who came said it was the largest nest he's seen in 30 years.. a tunnel under pine needles about 9ft long.. estimated 10,000 jackets. I was stung repeatedly all.ove my face and torso. Each sting left a welt the size of an egg.. it basically looked like someone tried to beat me to death with a baseball bat. 8 stings just on my face and neck... it was sooooooo bad. I just thank God it was me, and not my young daughter or dog, that got the attack.
Whoa! Is Stephen King your neighbor? A nest that big will surely have proliferated and spread out more queens in your area and worse, they’ll have the genes to grow that big as well... Time to mix up some lightning and keep it out there... plus, with that colony gone, more will move in from the surrounding area to take over and fill the void. Good Luck and I’m glad it didn’t kill you... I get stung by my honeybees occasionally but honeybee stings are nothing compared to yellow jacket wasp stings.
@@CaptainWingnut this was about 9 years ago. I have a row of 50 ft pine trees that line my yard.. I live up in the Ozarks.. And I hadn't raked the pine needles under them yet.. so there were 8 inches or so of needles lining the yard in that part of the property. I was actually out weed eating and I felt the first face hit. Thought it was a rock.. then I instantly got stung 4 more times on my face. I knew I was in trouble and ran. They got me over and over before I could run across the property to the house. I was covered in stings. I had dropped the weed eater and so many swarmed it that I could barely see it. One giant pile of jacks. And the entire front of my property.. that yard is about a half acre.. had a MASSIVE swarm. Thousands in the air. I actually called 911 because I was worried about so.many stings and so many in the air. The FD had an exterminator who crawled up to the needles in a bee suit and dumped some powdered poison mix into the hole. When he crawled back he told me he had never seen or imagined a yellow jacket tunnel that long and populated. It's crazy that i didn't know it was there.. but we live in the forest and have several acres and I see wasps en mass everyday.. And just didn't realise their nest was that close to the house itself. Sucked
@@CaptainWingnut very true. I can't lie. I'm a mountain boy and we have all kinds of critters here. I've interacted with so many that I usually don't have a lot of fear of insects, snakes, ect at this point... but this about scared me to death. By the time I got to the porch I was almost having a panic attack. There were just soooooo many. And you are 100% correct about the sting. I couldn't believe how intense each hit was. Felt like somebody was shooting me point blank with a pellet gun. I don't get rattled to often.. but I was shaking and shivering for about 20 minutes after. Again, I thank God it was me. Because I was actually going to have me 12 year old daughter weedeat while I used the tractor .. at the last second I decided to let her mow the back area while i weedeated between the trees. The thought of it happening to her makes me sick to.my stomach all these years latet.
Man that is terrible. Sounds like what happened to my neighbor when we were trail riding. He stepped on the next and and they lit him up. He ran home full sprint. Nearly a quarter mile. Yellow jacket nest was right next to the trail in some weird holes in the ground. They covered the tractor for 2 hours before we could recover it. A few days later i dumped a half gallon of gas in the whole and put a 5 gallon bucket over the top. At night time when they don't fly when they can't see. They were all gone in about a week. Yall be careful out there.
For those wondering about the effect on house pets, this is my understanding of how Boric acid works: Boric acid causes intestinal gas. Mammals can pass this gas, insects cannot. Thus the insects bloat and die. I have not had issues with my pets but the bugs are gone.
@@jrambo7495 Diatomaceous earth works differently... it is a desiccant. It works from the outside drying insects out when they touch it... boric acid works by short circuiting the insects nervous system from the inside. Insects nervous system is totally different from mammals. Boric acid is poisonous to mammals but the quantities have to be seriously high and its very bitter and distasteful. There is currently no scientific or medical data that any mammal has died from boric acid poisoning. It’s all conjecture, (i.e., if it can kill insects so well it will probably kill mammals). A recent European study that caused the banning of boric acid in Europe found that the only effect on mammals was that some rats became infertile, but the kicker is in the data details that everyone seems to ignore... They had to get them to their weight in boric acid... The studies don’t show how they did that, but I’m sure it was force feeding them because it is seriously nasty stuff to eat. I ate some as a kid thinking it was vitamin C and it was TERRIBLE tasting... Today my IQ is 168 so apparently there was no negative effect, or maybe there was,,, maybe I could have had an IQ of 200!! What ever you use, use MORE common sense.
This is our third season using this technique because it works! We have to adjust the amount of poison due to various flight distances because we have twenty cans covering a large area. But it works. Somebody needs to ominate this guy for a Nobel peace prize.
I met a guy who had something for that. He was leading a walking funeral procession, right behind the hearse, and had a Doberman Pinscher on a leash. Behind him was about fifty men in a single file following. I was curious and asked the guy whose funeral it was and he pointed to the hearse and said it was his mother-in-law. I then asked why the dog and he said it was the dog that killed her! Credulous I said that couldn't be, that the authorities would destroy the dog and he said, "Nope. He didn't touch her. They can't prove a thing. What he did was to keep acting like he was gonna tear her apart for days on end. And when she was a nervous wreck and scared to death of him, he rushed at her, snarling like he was gonna kill her, and she died of fright! She had a heart attack and dropped dead right there!" Intrigued I asked him, "Say mister. Is there some way I could buy or rent that dog so I can get rid of my mother-in-law too?", and he said... ..."Get in line."
Excellent advice, a rare commodity on TH-cam. Obviously you have thought this through since you’re a beekeeper. We have to presume this will work without harming one of the most endangered and valuable species of our lifetime. Thank you!
Exactly I have bees in the yard I like to keep around for the sake of my family’s plants but those damn wasps need to go! (Especially when they make their way into my room and wake me up by flying over my face🤣)
I own a small 150 acre ranch with a lot of buildings and barns and have had a wasp problem for a few years. I have been doing this all spring and have noticed a huge decline in their numbers. I put out these acid feeders then after a few weeks I put out some of the 2 liter traps and have just about taken care of all of them
So it’s August 27th 2022. At this time of year in New England, I wasn’t sure if meat was still a viable option or if fruit was the better option for late summer so I set out a boric acid laced smorgasbord! I’ve only had yellow jackets visit the buffet that I’ve seen. Some bumblebees perished in the traps with sugar water. :( So here’s the results. They did go for the cooked chicken finely diced but they’re really going for the fruit/veggie purée that comes in the squeeze pouches. It seems to be basically applesauce with minimal other mixed in. They also are enjoying cheap dollar store strawberry soda. I’ve seen them fight over the purée. Just letting folks know who are finding this wonderful video now about some other great options. I’m using shallow lids from jars. Thank you, Brad! Great video!
I can confirm this. Many years ago I worked for a pest control company that would spray for ants indoors with non toxic spray for pets and children. I noticed the active ingredient was boric acid.
@@maryduffy4843 Hi Mary. As an insecticide, there really isn’t a good alternative to boric acid. Some say to use bicarbonate of soda or diatomaceous earth, but they don’t work the same way. Boric acid disrupts the digestion process of an insect and then shuts down their nervous system. Baking soda and diatomaceous earth kill insects by dehydration, drying them out. All must be eaten by the insect to kill them. Boron and its by products such as boric acid have been unscientifically banned in some countries as a poison due to some crazy studies where they fed mice unbelievably high quantities. By size ratio, humans could not consume that much. What they found was that it caused infertility in rodents at extremely high doses. Boric acid has been used as a medicinal supplement and still, more in a moment. By the same science they could ban table salt, because if you eat too much it could kill you as well! The most interesting fact to me is that boron and boric acid is in the soil, air and all around us! Where can you get it? Try online. Its used as a dietary supplement (boron citrate) and perhaps you can get it that way (you’ll have to calculate the equivalency). Also, I think you can buy boric acid vaginal suppositories around the world. They are typically 600-800mg of boric acid and are used as a vaginal stabilizer for bacterial vaginosis (yeast infection). You might need a prescription!! The medical data shows that no one has ever died from using them. Maybe, medically, they’re allowed where you live. You would need approx 8 to make a tsp equivalent of boric acid powder. Some have additional ingredients like aloe which would not change the outcome of your insecticide. Good Luck, thanks for watching and subscribing.
When I moved into an apartment building in the NYC AREA, the place was loaded with both ants and roaches..I spread Boric Acid EVERYWHERE. In about 7-10 days, they were completely gone.
I lost my entire blackberry crop for the last two years to wasps and hornets. I have yet to come upon a solution that would allow the wasps hornets to self exterminate the colony until seeing this. This solution is ingenious and insidious. I absolutely love it. Many thanks!!!
4:20 for the mixing process... Apple juice 1/4 gal (.5*.5=.25) Boric acid 2 tsp Make sure it is 100% boric acid. (I noticed the bottle was half full, not half empty.)
@@CaptainWingnut I don't have all of the resources to make videos at all, plus it sounds like a lot of time consuming work, but you're right though, I should look into humer type stuff. I have a dad joke calendar ironically for Christmas recently
We used to use it on ants, mixed with honey. I didn't know about the concentration affecting the speed of kill, though. I used a different method to wipe out the wasps nesting in a tree above my vege garden. 4 days later, my cabbages were utterly destroyed by cabbage moth. I learnt my lesson. A few wasps around, especially when they aren't bothering you, is not necessarily a bad thing
Wasps provide some valuable services. Besides killing bad bugs, like you mention, they also clean up road-kill and other organic garbage laying around.
@@edwardgrit3074 Agreed. But if you trying to kill ants in your home, the bees shouldn't get it to it. We had to kill a mess of sugar ants that kept coming through the power outlets and light switches. We made a honey boric acid mix and put it in soda bottle lids (plastic) and carefully slid them into the outlets and put the faceplates back on. There was plenty of room to place the lid without touching any wires. No more ants after a few days.
Yes, wasps are very valuable. They are pollinators and they eat pests that destroy gardens like leaf minors. They love caterpillars, but they also love caterpillars that are beneficial like from the monarch butterfly. I hated wasps until I became an organic gardener. Now I welcome them. They have such a bad reputation unfortunately.
Wasps are good insects. Unless their nest is close-by they don't bother people and should be left alone. If their nest is in an inconvenient place then knock it down early in the morning quickly. They will build elsewhere and you won't see them again.
Thank you sir. Looking forward to trying this. I’m happy that I won’t be standing on a ladder with a sprayer around wasp nests. This seems like a safer alternative.
Really appreciate the information. Sometimes my family gets stung trying to build fence and repair fence. Those yellow jackets are relentless and keep stinging.
Thanks for the tips! I was attacked by a swarm last year while washing my car. I have grandchildren that play in my yard so I rather be safe than sorry.
I used to find the really big ants, take a stick and flick them into a medicine bottle filled with boric acid, shake it, then release the white ant so it could go back to the nest for a good cleaning, works like a charm. Plus you can watch the white dot as it heads towards home!
I have large red Harvester ants on my property, the only food for Horned Lizards, so I leave them alone. I want to try to get the State of Texas to release some Horned Lizards ( Horny Toad) here on my acreage. As far as the wasp, it’s WAR.
Because I'm sure someone will ask: Boric acid is essentially the same compound as borax, but significantly refined and purified. Borax should do the same job in killing insects, but it's not as potent. For insects that actually eat it mixed into food (rather than just coming into contact with the powder and later grooming themselves) I suspect it will be good enough. It has to actually get inside the insect to kill it, and not all insects groom. Borax was used as a detergent and for many other things a way back before other products mostly replaced it, so it's something you find in many an old garage and cleaning closet :)
I remember reading years ago about a woman in Texas who when building her new home filled the walls with boric acid. She was that scared of cockroaches.
Yeah, when they’re a onezie twozie you don’t notice them but when they get out of control and bloom,,, I don’t know if mongrels is a strong enough word... Thanks for commenting.
My dad used to make those traps with milk jugs filled with water, apple cider vinegar and a sprinkle of tuna fish. The tuna adds the protein that the hornet's and wasps require. My dad made a lot of them because his home has cedar siding and those insects love to bore into it.
No on the boric acid, the trap lures them and traps them inside, most just drown. You just fill the 2ltr and milk jugs 1/4 to halfway, keeps them upright and from blowing away
Thanks for this! I have been meaning to up put several cans for the wasps in my area, but did not! ☹️. This morning as I was in the garden I noticed a plump Monarch caterpillar munching on a Butterfly weed leaf. I went to go get my husband to show him (we have a butterfly garden, but as of late not many caterpillars), but by the time I got back a big red wasp had knocked it down and had stung it. Gosh I felt so bad…if only I had put the mix up earlier! Lesson learned!
I have used the boric acid and powdered sugar for ants for years, works like a dream. Thanks for the video letting everyone know. If you have red ants create a ring of the boric acid and powderd sugar around their main hills where the opening is.
Wow, great comment. Yes, all you’d have to do is put boric acid powder around the hill and they’ll walk through it. They’re social groomers so the colony will eat it and, viola, done and dusted! Thanks for watching and subscribing...
@@Red_Hairing Yes, but use common sense... you’re killing flying insects so put it where your outdoor pets (and unsupervised children) can’t get to it. The boric acid is way too weak to harm pets or children, but the WHY’s who feed on it will certainly protect and defend it with venom. Thanks for watching and a great question.
Our Texas red ants are becoming extinct because of the fire ant colonies entering into their nests and annihilating them, I understand. I prefer red ants to fire ants anyday. We played side by side outside when Mom sent us out...to get out of her hair....no bad fire ants back then. I have an acquaintance who tries to preserve his one huge red ant bed on his property by surrounding it with protection from fire ants.
Yellow jackets are the worst and most painful stings I have ever exeperienced and that is from a person who used to be anaphalactically allergic to wasp stings. Thanks for put this on!
@@CaptainWingnut They are certainly around me. I walked upon a nest that appeared to have been left and armadilloes had dug it up late this winter. Found a paper hornet's nest on a low hanging branch on my property winter before last. Thanks!
@@CaptainWingnut I was stung by 5 yellow jackets at once and it felt like the poison was slowly oozing down into the tissues of my legs with a feeling of being re stung again and again for about 8 hours. That was my particular experience with them. I actually get about 2 weeks of a europhoric pain relief with wasp stings these days. Not that I seek them out, but a total flip from how wasps affected me as a kid.
Thanks. We get a lot of wasps out here. I have only been stung once in my whole life, and it was this summer because they built a nest in our lawn decorations, and I didn’t think of the possibility. Well, the sting wasn’t that bad, but I sure hate having to be so cautious with everything. We have to knock down nests all the time on our clubhouse, under our pool deck furniture, on our deck, in our garage…it’s unreal. I am definitely going to try this. I bought some boric acid, and we always have juice and empty soda cans. Mama’s going to have a good time!💀💀💀😄
Keep in mind, Boric Acid is acidic. Borax is alkaline. Do not mix the two of those, or they cancel each other's acid/base extremes--that acidity or alkalinity is part of how they work. We've used Borax powder for decades to make this stuff. Alternately, I bot something called "Ants-B-Gone", that was made with Boric Acid and a "non-digestible sugar" [like artificial sugars, such as aspartame]. Making a syrup/nectar for them to eat, works slow in them, the gatherers take that nectar back to feed the queen and nest, they don't see anything sickly about the gatherers, so they also eat it...and the nest dies out instead of moving to new locations. These two things will NOT deter rodents though. For that, we specifically use Pennyroyal as a spray. I've also spread cayenne pepper [bought in bulk], where rodents walk, and they hate it and leave....although, you do NOT want to do that where your pet cats or dogs might walk--they won't like it either, and will be in terrible distress from licking it off their paws. Neither is it safe for kids to walk on. But borax has been safe for all kinds of bugs. Can stuff the powder under baseboards, under carpeting. We've even just sprinkled it thickly near a door where ants were trying to get in, and they left. That needed done for about 3 years in a row at this place, then they stopped coming. We had annual carpenter ants here in the PNW, trying to make inroads at our kitchen door. By stuffing borax under the doorsill, and laying a thick line of it along the foundation under the door, they quit...just went way. Another cheap, low-tech paper-wasp nest trick; Use brown paper lunch bag, blow it up like a balloon [kids can help]. Tie it off to hold that shape. Hang one of those in your eaves, near doors and windows. We have 2 in our front entry area, and a couple along the patio roof in back, and the paper wasps just look elsewhere to build, and stop bothering humans using doors and windows. CAVEAT: Ground-dwelling wasps ignore these--those guys are aggressive, and need to sip your recipes to get rid of those. Some will fight tenaciously against straight borax put at the entry of their nests--it took 3 summers to finally get rid of a huge next in our front garden--required a bee suit, LOTS of borax, and a shovel, to finally evict what was left of them---then their scouts have been trying to make nests behind window shutters...bad. Ground dwelling wasps in the PNW, are probably equals to the "murder hornets" that got here from Japan. Boric acid has long been used by a few companies, to brush down into cleaned carpets, so it gets deep into the fibers and down into the pad. This deters all bugs that tend to like carpets [like fleas, ticks, mites]. Alternately, could try diatomaceous earth powder brushed deep into the carpets, but those are sharp tiny bits, that might damage the carpet. But a carpet treated like that using boric acid, is listed as safe for crawling babies and small pets like dogs, cats, because it is brushed so deep into the carpet. Borax is your friend. So it Boric Acid. Especially if you live where bugs abound. You have some good recipes! Oh--Borax is also somehow good for helping a cob-type mix for plastering strawbale buildings..Years ago, I add about a couple Tblsp. of borax, a couple Tablesp. of a good waterproof white glue--wish I could remember the name of it; and added Pozolanic ash to that dirt + Portland mix, and the stucco came out fairly waterproof, fire resistant more than usual, and very sturdy.
Hey, I know it's a long time since you posted this message but I wanted to ask you if you were making the sugar water for these wasp traps using borax, how much would you use. I have borax but not boric acid and I have a wasp nest drilled into the cedar shakes right above my front door. My husband is deadly allergic to wasps. I tried spraying the nest with poison but they are still there. I want to try this. Please let me know.
@@oystergirl99 No problem! I comment on fossil posts & comments often! I doubt wasps are only just between shingles-more likely, they found a nice pathway up into a larger space-like your attic? If so, you need a pest control person to eradicate those. You don’t need both boric acid & borax--one is acid, other is alkaline…never use them together, cuz in this case, they cancel each other’s acid or base chemistry levels The old “Ants-B-Gone” recipe from the old chemist, as near as I have made it: Also known as “toxic nectar”: 1 cup water (or artificially sweetened cola), bring to simmer in a small pan. Borax, 1 Tblsp. at a time, til it looks like no more will dissolve. -OR- boric acid powder (NOT BOTH), added same way Nutrasweet packets, a few. (Skip this if using artificially sweetened cola) ( fake sugars are toxic: nutrasweet, & acesulfame potassium, also printed as “Ace-k”, or other abbreviations; sucralose is next. There are others) If a little more water is needed to dissolve particles of powders, add a little at a time…don’t want any more than necessary. Once it’s all a kind of heavy liquid, store in a clearly-labeled bottle, safe away from kids & pets. For most ants, just a bottle-cap full, placed in their path, or near nest entrance, usually does it. This is not my recipe; it was invented by a chemist in Martinez, CA, around 40 years ago. I only guesstimated it, & it’s been working. Bottle trap to catch flies, wasps: Use a pint water or soda bottle. Cut top off, just below where body of bottle starts to narrow…creating a funnel shaped part from the bottle top. Turn the funnel upside-down into the bottle, matching edge of funnel to edge of bottle body. Use a big pin or finishing nail to poke matching holes in each, to tie them together with a twist tie, & to attach a hanging wire. Add about 1/2 cup of the “toxic nectar” solution. Flying insects can crawl down into bottle thru the funnel, but have very hard time crawling out-especially if clear bottle has facets that reflect light-the refracting light from sun confuses their vision. And, when sun hits bottle, it heats up inside-also deadly for the insects. If it dries, or fills with dead insects, you can either take it apart to clean & refill it, or, throw it away & make another. If there’s hordes of insects, can hang multiple bottle traps. My DH donned a bee suit & aggressively pushed lots of plain borax into the big ground-wasp nest, 3 summers in a row, & soaked them with water hose, in turns. It did finally get rid of them, but it harmed the lilacs, lavender, & other plants over it & nearby it…I think it was what helped kill our elderberry bushes, too…but those could have been from a root fungus or something…& other problems. I don’t advise doing that, unless no other recourse. Part of what helped that effort, too, was hanging bottle traps within about 4’ of the entrances to that nest….but because the opening was so big & multiple, it made using only bottle traps harder-because so many wasps could fly out to attack. The opening in your shingles might be small enuf it only lets one or two in/out at a time??-so, a bottle trap might do it. In the cool of early morning, or late evening, when your shingle-wasps are not active yet, you might try: a mix of borax + nutrasweet, & maybe a bit of meat gravy to stick it together, & stuff it into the wasp entrance using a stick (not your fingers!), enuf to block their entrance. If enuf can shove into the hole, it can stop them getting in/out, & give them something to chew on that has calories….that might do the trick, too. “Paper wasps” build papery-layered round nests glued up under the eaves. They are territorial, so, if you hang a puffed-up brown lunch bag, tied at the neck & hung up under the eaves, before those start looking for nesting spots in spring-your fake nest brown bag will send them looking elsewhere. I’ve had one hung by each door for yeeears…this is first year of seeing a nest near our door…in decades if using this. But the ones just spotted, are a different kind of wasps…so, I’m keeping an eye on them….these guys look more like a kind of fly, but have built what looks like a paper wasp nest. These don’t seem to fly out to attack-have not seen any of their “attack squads”. These might be pollinator wasps or flies of some kind-we very much need pollinators-so, unless these act aggressive, I’ll leave them alone til cold weather, then remove the nest…… …..unless we get time to do a project there-than I’d put a plastic bag snugged around the nest, tighten it around the top, & scrape it from the wood…& take it way out back & stick it where those can’t hurt anyone Wasps depend on flight-a simple 3-speed fan could interrupt their flight…which might make them quit that shingle nest… ..…point fan so it blows up & out from your door area…or across & out--so the wind interrupts their flight path right by their entrance. They generally don’t fly at night, or in rain, or in heat of day….you might be able to timer the blowing fan to be on during morning, & from late afternoon til dark….that might be enough. Hope that helps!
@@macknumber9 Notice, it was not addressed to you, son of number9. . It really is ok to scroll past comments that don’t interest you, or that confuse you.
Good morning from NC. I have Japanese hornet nest at the base of tree in back yard. What can I do to exterminate them without paying an exterminator? Ideas, please. I have borax.
Started using this in August (early Spring here in New Zealand). I saw dozens of Queens every day for weeks coming for the mixture - thought it was never going to end. Didn't use cans - they didn't seem to like them - maybe the Queens were too big? So I used just lids from jars - sometimes with cotton swabs in them. Used for a multitude of bloody ants as well. Thought THEY were never going to end either lol. But after about 3 weeks, there were less and less and now in late summer (early February) - I haven't seen a wasp for ages. I still put out the apple juice mixture. And for the last couple of weeks an ant colony has arrived again - in my bathroom - and again it seems like it's getting worse - but I remember thinking this in spring after only a couple of weeks, so I'm expecting another week or so of the ants and then results. I thank you soooo much - wasps especially are a real problem in NZ and we're trying to eliminate them. THANKYOU 💜💜💜💜💜💜
i always found yellow jackets in the ground i have scuppernong vines never found any wasps in them yet i kill yellow jackets nest by pouring 1/2 cup gas into hole at night when they are all in the nest this is fatal
Thank you, so glad to find a way to rid the wasps without hurting the bees! It's good to know bees won't go for the diluted fruit juice because they want the good stuff! This sounds so much better than commercial pesticide poisons.
I have wasp swarming all over my chicken run. One of my hen suddenly died with no signs of illness or trauma. She was perfectly healthy the day before. I’m assuming the wasp attacked her. Yesterday I was stung by a wasp and it hurted so bad. I’m so glad I found your video! Thank you!!! 🙏
Thank you for posting this! We have dealt with yellow jackets for about 5 years. They have burrowed into our home three times creating lots of damage not to mention we have been stung repeatedly. They got so bad this year we were unable to enjoy our deck or patio space for fear of being stung. We have tried several methods to get rid of them. I will surely try your method. Thanks again.
Sorry to hear that. Yes they are insanely terrible here this year. We've had feeders out all summer... they don't want ANY sugar this fall... we've had success with tuna fish, but very watered down... they don't want the meat, just the juice off of it... we just keep adding water laced with boric acid to the tuna cans. Good Luck
I can not thank you enough for this video. I have a serious wasp problem but I have spent a decade making my property a haven for bees and the last thing I want to do is spray insecticides.
Thank you very much for teaching us how to get rid of wasps and hornets and leave the bees alone. I am blessed with bees that visit my garden and plants. Thank you very much indeed.
Try to make it easy for the hornets and wasps to consume the mixture and fly back to the nest. Why? The critters don’t consume the mixture themselves but feed it to the larvae in the nest that the queen lays. The larvae secretes a fluid that the critters consume for nutrition to stay alive. When the mixture is fed to the larvae they die so the food source for the hornets and wasps goes away too. The cycle is now broken.
Essential Tremor. I also have it. It runs in the family. You need a tripod that doesn't shake like your arm. The jiggling is enough to make a person seasick!
Here's a true story that happened to me in 1980, at a house we were renting... In the back yard, in an area of about 10' x 10', there was wall to wall cockroaches all over the ground. They were having a huge party. So I went to the store to buy 3 cans of RAID. I sprayed (I soaked) every cockroach in the yard... literally 100s of thousands of cockroaches. I figured, there would be dead cockroaches everywhere, the next morning. I checked it out the next day, and there wasn't a single dead cockroach on the ground. They went home. RAID was a waste of time and money.
Here is a true story about a house I purchased: It was wall-to-wall flies. Instead of bopping individual flies then sweeping their corpses, I got them with the vacuum cleaner. As I slowly slid the schnozzle toward them, their tiny feet dug in, their tiny wings fluttered, then... suddenly, they just disappeared. Like magic, but more fun!
I've been using boric acid for decades but found out that in MANY places you can be charged with manufacturing a pesticide without a license so maybe don't let everyone know what you are up to! They can really hurt you with fines and jail time when they want to be pricks about it. Boric acid, peanut butter and icing sugar is a great one for roaches, they love it and take it home to share, but of course making that where I live is a crime so I would never do it myself, never!
Most people don’t really understand how the laws work, I graduated Suma Cum Laude and worked in law for 20 years... Each law has elements or requirements and you have to break ALL of the elements to fulfill the law to get to the punishment section. If all of the elements are not met, no crime has been committed. SELLING the finished product is required to complete the elements of that crime... no one’s selling it here.
I moved into a dump about 3 years ago now. The german roaches were like sheets on the walls, in cabinets. It was a living nightmare. I made this massive bowl of the boric acid, powdered sugar, and 2 boiled eggs and put it everywhere. Haven't seen a roach in 3 years. Now the hornets and wasps on the other hand are taking us out here. Our walls outside are like overwhelmed and they come in all the time freaking us out!! So, I am going to try this right here!!! Thank you so so so much!
Thank you for this method - I was worried about getting the good bees so haven't used juice. Now I can try the pop can method. We found they're after protein in the Fall, and that's when they're most aggressive as well so I use meat for the bait. Also, when I find a starter nest in Spring, I spray it with the cleaner "Simple Green". Instant kill. If they're flying they drop out of the air. I even sprayed out a nest under the eaves of my house.
Spring is the best time to put this out. Every W.H.Y. flying is a QUEEN... so everyone that drinks the mixture is a colony "nest as you call it" that will die.
Good idea ! But all animals and insects play a part in the balance of ecology which mankind is the latest "Disruptor"of! Be careful as Bees are not the only Pollinators in The World and imagine how long it would take us to replace them so we can have food to eat! I Don't want to be Stung but I would place some Apple juice at least 5ft from my picnic so they join us at a separate table!
@@martinfontana3593 While I honestly appreciate your take on this issue I might add that having milk weeds and any kind of flowers will draw honey and bumble bees to your property and they are not as aggressive as Hornets and wasps are. For the last 3 years we have allowed milk weeds to grow wild here and mowed around them and they came around and haven't left. We have a TON of honey bees and bumble bees that come here every year since so we dont have any issues with pollination. Hopefully, if you are having an issue with that this will help a little bit at least. Plus, if you have a garden dont forget that YOU can pollinate the plants by hand. Weve also done that and been very successful with our little garden crops.
Some insects like sugar, some like protein and others like both. I have found putting some egg shells in a plastic bag put some boric powder and sugar mix. Shake the bag. Distribute the egg shells around your property . For outdoors you can place the egg shells in upside down containers held up by a stake so the rain does not get inside. You can also use egg white in other custom made containers that are water proof.
Great advice, thank you! I've been looking for different ways to keep these hateful wasps away and not hurt the bees and also not use a ton of chemicals bc we also have animals that I don't want hurt.
Thanks Lacey. Boric acid used to be the standard chemical for commercial pest control. One retired guy who had a huge pest control business in California (over 100 trucks) said they used to use this exact recipe (this is where I got it) exclusively for crawling insects. He said it was so effective that they didn’t get call backs to re-treat so the industry moved to other chemicals that weren’t so long term effective. He also told me, and I never researched it, that the chemicals that they use today are worse in toxicity than boric acid. I have another response posted where I break down just how diluted this is on the toxicity scale. Thanks for your reply.
@@CaptainWingnut I think the big online delivery place docked my reviews because of an industry grievance. I might have posted a recipe...they hate when the secrets get out. I don’t want strangers and their chemicals traipsing near me.
I just got my boric acid today I am going ot get this made up and get it out in my front yard...praying it works,I have a ton of these little buggers this year .thanks for the info...
I've got red wasps that love to loiter around my cameras on my house which constantly set them off and fill up my video storage with nothing but video clips of wasp butt. I've formally declared war on them by sticking my head out of my front door and yelling in front of my neighbors who weren't aware of what was happening "THIS MEANS WAR!!" to no effect. I learned regular spray wastes time and money so with this information on boric acid, I'm headed to Wal-Mart. Thank you. I'm confident the tides of war are about to change in my favor.
Great Video, Sir. One small thing ---- the yellow and black insects are Yellow Jackets and are found throughout North America (even up to my house in Alaska). There are similar and other versions like Bald Faced Hornets and both in-ground and above ground Yellow Jackets but they all die from the Boric Acid. The interesting thing about ants and yellow Jackets is that they are cannibalistic and so that is one reason it takes a while for the entire nest to die-off. I have used Sodium Borate ( 20 Mule Team Borax --- NOT Boraxo and certainly not Boric Acid --- ) with table sugar for ants and it has worked exceptionally well in Northern Idaho - where we have a lot of ants. - Joe -
@@CaptainWingnut Just to make sure I'm understanding you correctly... Borax and Boric Acid work *equally well* against wasps? Is there any reason to search out boric acid if I already have borax on hand?
I second the sugar/boric acid mix. They all leave your affected area and go to the mixture. Next few day mostly gone. Hummingbird feeder is ant free with a smaller container of the sugar/boric acid at the base. I use a COTTON BALL as a wick. They just go nuts eating it.Termites hate boric acid too.
This is genius! I was thinking about knocking down the nest to get rid of my problem but you have saved the danger from me doing that and also got to the root of the problem. I will definitely be trying this out.
I have a white faced hornets nest on the side of my house about six feet away from a window that is always open this time of years so that the cats can go in and out as they please. Only two of them have actually come into the house as far as i know. One of them died on a kitchen counter, and am not sure why. The other one i thought was dead floating in a bowl filled with water in the sink. I scooped it out with a spoon and noticed it was still alive. I could have just washed it down the sink, but decided to just toss it out the window where it could possibly recover and rejoin the hive. If it has any intelligence it will know that coming in the house is not the safest place to go. That nest has been there for a few weeks, but i just noticed it a couple days ago. I am out there frequently doing yard work and hanging out with the cats. I have never even seen any of the hornets fly anywhere near me. So far, i have been leaving them alone and they have been leaving me and the cats alone. They have been doing their thing which is probably hunting other bugs in my yard and working on their hive. At this point, i am not really sure what i will do about it. I just might try this method instead of directly confronting the nest.
If you’re currently in pest control, this so good, it is a job killer for pest control!! A friend of mine years ago worked for a large pest company and they weren’t allowed to use this because it was so long term...
We had a serious ant problem inside our house this spring. I tried all sorts of comercial products but they did nothing. Then I recalled how we got rid of a carpenter ant infestation a couple decades ago so I knew just what to do. I sprinkled diatomaceous earth, sometimes with powdered sugar, usually not, around my yard, doors, cracks in the foundation and anywhere else ants could possibly be getting in and the problem disappeared virtually instantly. Haven't seen a single ant in my house since.
How did you get the carpenter ants to take up the diatomacious earth , did you mix it with sugar and water to make a can trap like this video, or just use it dry mixed with sugar? Did you have to put it in their burrow holes directly? (I thought they eat the wood?)
@D M I used a commercial product that came in a special squeeze bottle with a spout to put through the holes in the wall. It was decades ago, so I'm not certain, but I believe it was called "Bug-b-Gone". The powder would fly out when you squeeze the bottle. TBH, I have no idea what was in there besides the DE. When I use DE to get rid of ants these days, I mix a little icing sugar into it. Not much, though. About a teaspoon per cup. A single application last summer took care of the problem for months. I normally apply it twice per summer.
@Susan Trice It takes a little while to kill them. Not very long, though. DE feels like a soft powder to us, but it's actually made up of billions of tiny skeletons of ancient marine organisms. It has many sharp edges and points on each tiny piece. It cuts and pokes holes in the ant's exoskeletons, and they die of dehydration. It also clings to their bodies and goes back home with them. If they eat it or actively carry some home, thats just a nice bonus. If you would like to hit them with a double blow, mix some half and half borax and icing sugar and sprinkle some of that on top or beside the DE. Just a bit, though. You don't want to cover all the DE. You aren't likely to kill off the entire colony outside of the house; however, once all the scouts who go into your house start dying, there won't be many more following their scent trails in there.
If there's a colony inside your walls, you have to "spray" lots of it directly into all the areas they have infested. That means, drilling several holes into each wall and using a special bottle with a tip you can stick into each hole and then you squeeze the bottle a few times to blow DE around behind the wall.
I never understood why my dad didn't like cotton candy, and then he told me the story of when he went to some fair when he was a little kid with my grandparents. He got some cotton candy on a stick and was enjoying it as most little kids do, only to bite some that a hornet had found first. Needless to say, but that hornet tore up the inside of his mouth. Guess now I know... (Love and miss you Pop!)
I'll have to show this to my grandfather because the lake house gets infested on the outside by yellow jackets on the summer and my 6 year old nephew always gets stung. Thank you, good sir!
We live on a lake as well and the yellow jackets are everywhere. My small dog accidentally stepped on a nest on the way to our dock, his head was covered with them, seven of us also got stung. I grabbed my dog up and we all ran and hit the water. I hate them! We also have Cicada killer hornets this year. They are terrifying!
@@KnowEyes When we first moved into the mountains the WHY’s were terrible and thick… they killed two of my honeybee colonies… I put this out and taught my neighbors (who are distant) and it took about 3 years until we had tamped down enough that their numbers are not big enough to dare to take on a honeybee colony. I also got what I think are Russian honeybees who are real nasty and fight hard against them… they’re almost pure black and extreme over producers of honey, but they are the girls with attitude. My sister calls them “X” Factor bees. Where I used to work them with bare hands and arms and in shorts with just a veil, I now have to be in long pants, and full bee suit…
The comment from Ian is correct. I read on tube the the wasps are predators and collect food for the larve. which in turn provide an excretion that the adult wasps feed on. After summer and the food source dies off , the wasps turn to sweet. Which explains why you see them at picnics, cook outs, etc. Everything has a bit of good/bad.
Whenever you're mixing up concoctions into drinks bottles, do put a sticker on top of the label just to warn others what is inside ìt. Or masking tape over their printed label and write over the top.
I don’t think boric acid in these amounts is overly toxic to humans or animals. That being said, the first thing I did when I got back from the grocery store was to firmly tape a post it note on the apple juice container saying, “Bottle contains boric acid and DO NOT drink any of the juice in this container. It’s for our wasp friends” 😂
Good video - thank you. FYI - regarding the mix ratio of apple juice to boric acid, your container of apple juice is a 3 quart, not a gallon container .
I just have one suggestion. Take the label that says apple juice off of that bottle and put it with skull and crossbones on it in case you ever got children around and they thought that was apple juice... ;-)
First: Great idea for people who have idiot children running around loose. I'm all about common sense for your own life purposes. It's no longer my job to tell people how to think logically with common sense or otherwise, but I'm constantly reminded that some people can only do what they're told and others can only run about ringing alarms that something might happen. My disclaimer is and has always been: This is what I do, ALWAYS use your own common sense. Second: Find my scientific response regarding if someone were to drink this potion and how diluted the borax or boric acid is, and Third: On our ranch, if a child is clever enough to get past the dogs and the stinging honeybees, but dumb enough to think that a jug hanging from a tree in the bee yard (out of reach I might add) with flies, wasps and hornets all over it is "apple juice", they're not really children, they're aliens. Okay so my grandfather grew up next to Skinwalker ranch and our ranch is 35 miles due west of that, and we do have strange unexplained anomalies here too, so perhaps some aliens might masquerade as children and have no clue of the warning signs, but they've still gotta get past the dogs, the bees and the ranch hands!
@@CaptainWingnut yeah, back when I was a kid 50's-60's never once heard of a kid chugging some horrible smelling liquid. People today are afraid of everything and the mask wearing bs proves that.
I have a wasp nest somewhere near my balcony. Sit out there every morning for six or seven years. They know I'm there. I know they're their. Never been stung once.
It only really happens when you dont notice them and end up grabbing one on a chair that you didnt see, or sitting on it etc...my mom was stung on the lip after drinking from a can she left out
Thank you new beekeeper here. Pure sugary soda pop, tuna, hamburger, tuna & vinegar, etc. There are tons of comments here of different baits people use at different times of the year. I notice that early in the spring they go for sweet. Mid summer they go for protein (same with ants) and late summer early fall they’re back to sweet. I usually put out 7-10 jugs, each with a different bait to cover the gambit. I just noticed yesterday, they’ve been avoiding the apple juice and eating the tuna & vinegar. Watch their behavior and see what they’re searching for it possible. That may give you a clue. Otherwise, try many different baits... They’ve got to eat, just figuring out what is is they want at the particular time of year, in your particular area is the test. Good Luck and thanks for watching wisdom from knowledge.
What a great comment “@Conspiracy Discernment”. Just a note to a new beekeeper. Always watch your bees behavior before using this. We were very hot and dry for 6 weeks and I had to take my WHY feeders down as my bees wanted ANY water they could get and I didn’t want them taking the boric acid laced water back to the honey mills. We’ve had monsoon rains daily now tor 3 weeks but I see my bees are still taking water from the dog bowls, bird baths and buckets with rain water, so it will still be a few weeks before I can put the lightning back out for the WHY’s. On a brighter note, I seldom see a WHY right now anyway, but that doesn’t mean they won’t migrate in with the smell of honey in the air.
@@Rogerabushh Well, I'll just throw this out here for what it's worth: My Mom will turn 101 years old in August. Her favorite drinks are coffee and Pepsi and she drank them all her life and still does. So I'm of the opinion that although you may be right about it being a slow acting poison, its slow enough that I won't concern myself over it. I'm 67 and my sister is 78 so there's that.
Thank you sooooooo much!! I have tried everything to rid our yard of wasps and nothing has worked until I found your video. Within days of using your recipe the wasp’s where gone.
A recent comment the person said they put it out and never saw WHY’s at the can but they disappeared anyway. They removed the cans and within weeks the WHY’s were back making nests… the cans come back out. I too see them on the ranch pestering the honeybees. I re-energized my hanging jugs with new mixture and while I never see WHY’s at the jugs, within a week I find no more pestering the honeybees. Thanks for a positive comment.
Yup. I was up working with the bees today, putting on honey supers and they’re having nothing to do with the tainted nectar in the jugs and we haven’t seen a wasp or hornet around the bees since we brought them out of winter quarters 2 months ago.
Left 4 cans out for about 9 hours and they didn't even touch it. Also had a 2 liter bottle trap with just plain Sprite and they didn't go near that either. I'm going to add raw chicken or maybe cat food into all of them tomorrow and will update if I have any success. It's really strange though, I remember as a kid we always covered our soda cans right away because they would be drawn to it instantly...my sister actually drank one before and learned the hard way. Makes you wonder about all these genetically engineered mosquitoes and God knows what else they're releasing out there...
Thank you. We have a pool and there's always wasps flying around. My kids don't want to get into the pool mostly because of the wasps. Heading to the dollar store. 👍
The best way to determine when you should start using these in spring is to look for two main signs that will trigger new queens to start building nests for the season. 1) Four straight days where the low temperature is 42 or more degrees 2) Look for flower growth in the area, while the queen will be mostly gathering protein from insects to get the first generation of workers up and running, she still has to sustain herself as well and adult wasps do not eat protein they eat sugar. Yellow jacket colonies are pretty difficult to spot through spring and even much of summer, because during these times food is abundant and the foragers generally don't have much interaction with humans as they are so busy gathering food and tending to the brood. Their aggression levels are not so high until around the last week of September-Early October where they are relentless pests as the queens have left the nest seeking out hibernation spots, meaning no new brood is in the nest to feed the adult workers, adult yellow jackets get much of their food from the young larvae who secrete a sugary substance. So basically the queens leave the nest, food becomes scarce, aggression levels go way up until the adult worker population starves to death which by late season means thousands of yellow jackets and it can take them weeks to die off. The problem with just killing them off is that you may see a spike in other pest insects such as moths or even worse flies, these are insects that you will not have much luck with controlling using boric acid, it is probably better to allow Yellow Jacket colonies to exist around your property from late March-Late July/Early September before eliminating them, as by that time they will have greatly checked local pest populations for the season while not being overly annoying toward the human population.
Thank you for your insights! Quite frankly, there are so very many around here, I doubt killing them *all* is a concern ;-). The wasps and yellowjackets have been in & around this house for fifty years, probably some big nest locked between the walls :: ugh :: when it was built in the 70s. Back then they just slapped stuff together, and if they did it fast enough, it wouldn't bug the workmen. Uh ...
@@HighLevelNinja If you live in the South or somewhere where there isn't really a winter season my advice won't apply, we have a yellow jacket season here in WV during spring/summer but because they die off in the fall there are no super nests here that takes long periods of time in a constantly warm environment.
I felt good when you said take an old pop can. Yes sir your right, it's a pop can. I moved 45 mins south 8 years ago and I stand alone in my area as the only man who drinks pop. We don't have "soda" in my home. We're a pop drinking house.
Just started this trick today. A few weeks ago we went after an underground yellow jacket nest that was about the size of a lawnmower with shovels and a makeshift flamethrower and protective bee suits. We unearthed a lot of their nest and burned it, but it seems we didn't quite get it all. I bought some apple juice and boric acid yesterday and mixed with it water in a red solo cup with some small twigs poking out from the top. I'll get back in two weeks to share the results :)
After having the mixture out there for about two weeks, I noticed there was no effect on the yellow jackets. I may have put far too much boric acid into the mix and they may have decided it tasted bad. I decided to just go ahead and dump gasoline down into their nest and lit it on fire.
@@shellyd9287 I don't, sorry. It was just a quick flash and it was over. I kind of think the fumes from the diesel alone was enough to kill them, as by the time I was ready to light it, all activity had already stopped.
Oh yeah, DIY is the way to go if you know the cheap secrets... Good on you. Thanks for watching... make sure you subscribe and hit notify as I’ve got a ton more common sense vids coming.
I’m trying this! I’m in south Spain and have such a lot of wasps this year we even got a professional to spray and remove the nests. He removed 6 large nests BUT we still have loads of wasps!!! I’m hoping it works as well here as it does in The States 🤞
I remember having a little orange soda left n a can and later the wasps were all over it.. I didn't know the boric acid trick back then, but they sure like the sweet syrupy taste of orange soda..thx for the tip..
Awhile back I was way back in the woods and I grabbed a swig of my canned Mountain Dew and a hornet had flown into it. Stung me right on the top lip. I jus thank God I didn't swallow him.
@@garyjones2582 😁Ya he didn't make it but if that big ol sucker had stung me in the tounge or throat I might not have. I ain't ever left my drink open since then
I think that most of these videos are intended for people that have infestations this man is obviously a beekeeper so I think he has respect for nature in general
Last year, this worked great! It worked this spring as well. But this summer I noticed they had a nest up again. I put out more and they didn't take the bait! I did use the boric acid for roaches, so I will look for the pure boric acid and try again.
Good informational video Brad. I also appreciate all the additional info you took the time & effort to type into your description summary. Thanks! **For the bugs that think you speak to slow, tell them to try bumping their playback speed up to 1.25 in the settings cog.
Thanks for the comment... When I was a rat, living in the rat race, I spoke fast and furious. When I retired and moved to the country I was able to slow down. I can speak fast and furious but nowadays, I chose not to. The ranch animals don’t care. It’s so sad that more and more people are so judgmental and critical of each other today. If you’re not perfectly scripted, don’t have perfect cameras, sound and fancy Hollywood editing effects, they feel like they’re being jipped. Everyone has this wayward concept that they are in competition with everyone for everything. Fewer and fewer people think of others and “pay it forward” and conversely more and more people are very selfish thinking only of themselves. It’s just a sign of what I call the “fast food society”. Drive up, order a burger, drive to the next window, pay and get your burger... drive away eating as you drive. No waiting. People want it now... not in 10 seconds...not in 1 min. The tolerance level of people today is down to seconds. How long does it take you to cook a burger? Yeah, right. Everything in life has a cost and more and more people want someone else to pay the cost for them. People pass you on the road just to turn off the road as soon as they pass... This impatience is causing massive stress on people and they don’t realize that they probably won’t live to be as old as I am. Slow down, smell the roses. You don’t have to go through life in competition with everyone and every thing. You’ll die of stress related illnesses long before your time and the sun will still come up again in the East and set in the West.
@@CaptainWingnut Great words of wisdom & observations of the world around us Brad. Personally, I'm none too thrilled with the ways of the inconsiderate, hurry-up, point & click, world it's become. I'm grateful I'm not a young kid growing up in this society with a whole lifetime ahead of me. I'm probably even more grateful that I'm not a parent raising a kid these days. I very much envy the life you've been able to make for yourself...you're basically living my dream. I have a feeling you & I would probably get along great. Thanks again for sharing...
@@kailarsen6148 Thanks for the positive comment. Yes life out here is tough but very rewarding. Right now we have cougars hunting deer on the property and I just had to reprimand a grandchild not to walk around in the trees without an armed adult present. We’ve never had a bad incident, but theres always a first. We have had the big cats stalk kids even with an adult present but a warning shot usually makes the point.
@@CaptainWingnut Yeah, none of those big cats are anything I'd want to tangle with...they are very tough and need to be respected. I suppose about all you can do is try to be super aware of what's around you and take all the proper precautions. I'm a big animal lover but I know they don't all love me back the same way, so I'm willing to give them all the space & respect they need to struggle for life in their "fight for survival" world. It's nature, but hopefully there aren't so many that things get too dangerous for you...especially after dark...YIKES! Have a safe Memorial Day weekend Brad!
@@CaptainWingnut Hey Brad, I hope you are still safe & well. I'm back with a question for you about an excessive fly problem I'm having this year. I've had hornets just about every year so I was anticipating using your "Boric Acid In A Pop Can Trick" this year. For some reason the hornets haven't really been a problem this year but I've had an abundance of Flies around. I was just wondering if you could share any technique you may have for eradicating an excess fly problem? The dang things are making it miserable to be outside and impossible to enjoy the patio & backyard, THANK YOU SIR!
Thank you so much Brad for the helpful information. You are quite an intelligent person and also an humble man. My hat is off to you sir. I am definitely going to try your procedure. Here in south Georgia we have a terrible problem with fire ants and I hope this procedure will help to control them. We also have a generous supply of wasps and hornets. Thanks again for the help and keep up the good work.
Speaking of boric acid ... living in a 20 story Apartment building in the heart of a big city, at least a couple of times a month, when entering my kitchen in the dark and turning on the light, to my horror I would see a roach caught in the light, running like hell. Even though WE did not have roaches nor did the majority of our neighbors, every once in a while, unknown to us, one or more nearby neighbors apparently would get roaches and covertly spray their apartments ... causing the roaches to run for cover ... unfortunately to nearby apartments. Mine included! This happened a couple of times a month over a decade! To make a long story short, we just so happened to plan on redoing our kitchen. A friend of mine once said that boric acid kills any roaches that come in contact with it. After ripping out all of the kitchen cabinets right down to the floor, I purchased a small can of boric acid ... about half the size if a can of Comet ... equipped with a sprinkle-top ... just like the Comet. The cabinets came in. I washed the kitchen floor wall to wall. After dry, I sprinkled a generous amount of the powdered Boric Acid first completely around the periphery of the room where th floor meets the walls. The after tracing where the cabinets would cover the floors ... I sprinkled that whole area too. We then carefully brought in and installed the cabinets. That was 30 years ago ... and we NEVER HAD ANOTHER ROACH IN MY KITCHEN SINCE THEN. NOT ONE!! The funny thing is we have never had any insect in the kitchen at all since then. Not even flies in the summer like we used to have. No more cobwebs in the corners, no moths flying in ... NO NOTHING!!
In my other video “KILLING COCKROACHES & ANTS PERMANENTLY th-cam.com/video/FU8rAKipXVY/w-d-xo.html There are many testimonials of people living in huge apartment complexes and after putting out boric acid religiously, the entire building becomes roach free… its a wonderful mineral.
I’m gona try this ! Thanks I looked all over town for Boric Acid no one carried it. Not even Canadian Tire or the local Hardware store. But I found some Borax at the grocery store. I’m going to try it.
@@AdamRasmussenAstronaut it’s not Hornet season yet but I tried it on ants. It was not that affective for the ants but I did try and make a paste and puncture hole in the lid of a small canning mason jars and filled them with a borax paste of sugar and honey and the put them on their side and put them everywhere I saw ants and it worked well for ants. And it was waterproof so its lasting a long time . And very effective . But your method works great I’m sure for hornets and wasps 👍
@@AV1611-truth thanks for replying, Dianne. I’ll have to try it out. I had read the Borax didn’t work. Sounds like proof is in the pudding and you got it.
Glad I found this video. I need to find some boric acid and then I'm totally doing this. I just got stung the other day, as wasps have a nest under my ramp to the rear door of my house, and I didn't know. My leg felt weird for a few days after the pain went away. My kid had a friend over too, and he got stung around the same area. I don't have a bee suit or anything to attempt lifting the ramp out of there, though I did put out a trap. But this seems like an even better idea, to me.
I cannot wait to give this a go. Not only is there a bad problem with yellow jacket hornet but also the bald faced aggressive monsters as well as paper wasps. I don't know if the fires we had stirred them from their homes, but I can't even go outside to enjoy the weather. I have all kinds of traps out and they are full but no relief from their sheer numbers. I will let you know how it goes.
These are such prolific insects that I don’t think that enough people could do this to really put a serious dent in their population. I’ve kept these traps out from March to October for years. When we first came to the ranch their numbers were seriously scary and they knew they had the power to just take over. Now we only see a few throughout the summer but as fall comes on we always see an influx, especially around the beehive colonies. That’s when I pull out the big guns and put out a LOT of feeders, even right next to the beehives as you see in the video. I alway stay and watch to make sure no honeybees want to sip the swagga and after a nice 20min rest just watching, when I see that the only takers are hornets and wasps, I’ll leave. I come back daily to fill the pop cans being very careful not to alert the wasps and hornets in the cans as that can have consequences, but after about 3-5 days, the wasps and hornets are gone from the beehives and the bees calm down without the constant threats and bombardment. Thanks for watching and good luck and don’t forget to use wisdom (common sense) in all that you do.
Hi Alan, Sorry about the sound volume. I just ordered a separate wireless mic to fix that issue. I made this video at the request of some friends and didn’t expect it to explode like it has. I’m grateful for everyone like you who get something out of it and support my efforts to teach things I was taught many moons ago. Also, I made this video on an old PC with old video software. It didn’t do very well and couldn’t boost sound or stabilize video. I think it took over 18 hours to render and crashed the PC often. I recently bought a Macbook Pro and added Final Cut Pro X, Apple Motion, Pixelmator Pro, Photoclip and a few others. I have a DJI Mavic drone and love it so I just bought a DJI Osmo Mobile 2 to help stabilize my hand held work with my iphone. The Mac is blast fast at rendering and the software allows me to boost sound and stabilize my shaky video better. I’ve got a ton of film in the can - so to speak, of other things, it’s just getting the quite time to sit at the Mac now, learn new software and knock out some more vids. Thank you very much for your support and comments.
It worked!!!! thank you for advice on getting rid of wasps. They were really bad. Do you have anything like this for spiders?
Glad to be of assistance. Spiders video on the story board.
@@CaptainWingnut Hello Shelley. I appreciate your wise videos very much. Can you tell me how to find the spider video? I am a technical dinosaur and can’t find what the story board is to locate it. Thank you 👍👏👏
I don't see it anywhere either. Subscribed.
@@Amy-dw7ii it's a video from August 17th 2021. I hope that helps. th-cam.com/video/pVndhssiYlk/w-d-xo.html
@@Amy-dw7ii th-cam.com/video/pVndhssiYlk/w-d-xo.html
Thank You Sir. The old ways are usually the best. My sons have learned that dad may not be able to pass on a wealth of money, but my wealth of knowledge is far more valuable.
Most kids today only want the money, they don’t want to have to do anything for it, speaking from experience.
@@CaptainWingnut They are definately like that in England, are you in America, if so it probably means it is worldwide.
@@chrisspere4836 Yes Chris, we’re in Utah, USA.
thanks for watching
@Tee Mack Thank You Tee mack.
relax grandpa, glad I sense enough not to have any kids !!!
Thank you! I used the soda can boric acid.... first the wasps showed up and we're gone 2 weeks later....then yellow jackets gone after 10 days... now hornets are dying off after about 10 days. THIS STUFF WORKS!!!!!! A thousand times thank you!!!!
You’re very welcome… glad it worked for you.
Do you know if it Works for Cicada killers?
I know this is quite old.. 4 years now. But I still wanted to thank you, going to try this up at our cabin in a couple weeks when we go open it.
We have ground wasps up there, last summer I was swarmed and stung repeatedly all over… from my toes to my face over a dozen times. It was soooo painful! It ruined the rest of my summer up there, was too afraid to sit on the deck or go down to the lake, they were everywhere. My pup was stung several times too. 😢
I sure pray this works! 🙏🏼
Great tip. I live in the Ozark mountains and about 9 years ago was viciously attacked by yellow jackets. The folks who came said it was the largest nest he's seen in 30 years.. a tunnel under pine needles about 9ft long.. estimated 10,000 jackets. I was stung repeatedly all.ove my face and torso. Each sting left a welt the size of an egg.. it basically looked like someone tried to beat me to death with a baseball bat. 8 stings just on my face and neck... it was sooooooo bad. I just thank God it was me, and not my young daughter or dog, that got the attack.
Whoa! Is Stephen King your neighbor?
A nest that big will surely have proliferated and spread out more queens in your area and worse, they’ll have the genes to grow that big as well...
Time to mix up some lightning and keep it out there... plus, with that colony gone, more will move in from the surrounding area to take over and fill the void.
Good Luck and I’m glad it didn’t kill you... I get stung by my honeybees occasionally but honeybee stings are nothing compared to yellow jacket wasp stings.
@@CaptainWingnut this was about 9 years ago. I have a row of 50 ft pine trees that line my yard.. I live up in the Ozarks.. And I hadn't raked the pine needles under them yet.. so there were 8 inches or so of needles lining the yard in that part of the property. I was actually out weed eating and I felt the first face hit. Thought it was a rock.. then I instantly got stung 4 more times on my face. I knew I was in trouble and ran. They got me over and over before I could run across the property to the house. I was covered in stings. I had dropped the weed eater and so many swarmed it that I could barely see it. One giant pile of jacks. And the entire front of my property.. that yard is about a half acre.. had a MASSIVE swarm. Thousands in the air. I actually called 911 because I was worried about so.many stings and so many in the air. The FD had an exterminator who crawled up to the needles in a bee suit and dumped some powdered poison mix into the hole. When he crawled back he told me he had never seen or imagined a yellow jacket tunnel that long and populated. It's crazy that i didn't know it was there.. but we live in the forest and have several acres and I see wasps en mass everyday.. And just didn't realise their nest was that close to the house itself. Sucked
@@joshythehand2960 I’m serious... Stephen King couldn’t have created a more scary tale...
@@CaptainWingnut very true. I can't lie. I'm a mountain boy and we have all kinds of critters here. I've interacted with so many that I usually don't have a lot of fear of insects, snakes, ect at this point... but this about scared me to death. By the time I got to the porch I was almost having a panic attack. There were just soooooo many. And you are 100% correct about the sting. I couldn't believe how intense each hit was. Felt like somebody was shooting me point blank with a pellet gun. I don't get rattled to often.. but I was shaking and shivering for about 20 minutes after. Again, I thank God it was me. Because I was actually going to have me 12 year old daughter weedeat while I used the tractor .. at the last second I decided to let her mow the back area while i weedeated between the trees. The thought of it happening to her makes me sick to.my stomach all these years latet.
Man that is terrible. Sounds like what happened to my neighbor when we were trail riding. He stepped on the next and and they lit him up. He ran home full sprint. Nearly a quarter mile. Yellow jacket nest was right next to the trail in some weird holes in the ground. They covered the tractor for 2 hours before we could recover it. A few days later i dumped a half gallon of gas in the whole and put a 5 gallon bucket over the top. At night time when they don't fly when they can't see. They were all gone in about a week. Yall be careful out there.
For those wondering about the effect on house pets, this is my understanding of how Boric acid works:
Boric acid causes intestinal gas. Mammals can pass this gas, insects cannot. Thus the insects bloat and die. I have not had issues with my pets but the bugs are gone.
Thanks Paul
There might still be long term ill effects against the pets, in some other way.
Use diatemaceous earth!
@@jrambo7495 Diatomaceous earth works differently... it is a desiccant. It works from the outside drying insects out when they touch it... boric acid works by short circuiting the insects nervous system from the inside. Insects nervous system is totally different from mammals. Boric acid is poisonous to mammals but the quantities have to be seriously high and its very bitter and distasteful. There is currently no scientific or medical data that any mammal has died from boric acid poisoning. It’s all conjecture, (i.e., if it can kill insects so well it will probably kill mammals). A recent European study that caused the banning of boric acid in Europe found that the only effect on mammals was that some rats became infertile, but the kicker is in the data details that everyone seems to ignore... They had to get them to their weight in boric acid... The studies don’t show how they did that, but I’m sure it was force feeding them because it is seriously nasty stuff to eat.
I ate some as a kid thinking it was vitamin C and it was TERRIBLE tasting... Today my IQ is 168 so apparently there was no negative effect, or maybe there was,,, maybe I could have had an IQ of 200!!
What ever you use, use MORE common sense.
@@CaptainWingnut you incorrect that boric acid short circuits their nervous system. What it actually does is bloat them.
This is our third season using this technique because it works! We have to adjust the amount of poison due to various flight distances because we have twenty cans covering a large area. But it works. Somebody needs to ominate this guy for a Nobel peace prize.
How do you mix it? I'm not having success.
@@mandyknable8373I haven't tried it yet but he started with a quart of apple juice an a quart of water an 2 teaspoons of boric acid mix well
Yes, I know this works for aunts .. ... but what about mother-in-laws ???
I met a guy who had something for that. He was leading a walking funeral procession, right behind the hearse, and had a Doberman Pinscher on a leash. Behind him was about fifty men in a single file following. I was curious and asked the guy whose funeral it was and he pointed to the hearse and said it was his mother-in-law. I then asked why the dog and he said it was the dog that killed her! Credulous I said that couldn't be, that the authorities would destroy the dog and he said,
"Nope. He didn't touch her. They can't prove a thing. What he did was to keep acting like he was gonna tear her apart for days on end. And when she was a nervous wreck and scared to death of him, he rushed at her, snarling like he was gonna kill her, and she died of fright! She had a heart attack and dropped dead right there!"
Intrigued I asked him, "Say mister. Is there some way I could buy or rent that dog so I can get rid of my mother-in-law too?", and he said...
..."Get in line."
Mothers-in-law
Ask her if she’s heard the good news as you hand her a JW pamphlet ... she probably won’t ever be back.
I wish my Motber-in law was still alive She always kept my side and my wife "in line."
Lol
Love how he laughed about the “bite you” part and clarified they sting. Useful info
I come back to this video annually to remind me how to mix this stuff up. Thanks again!
Does it work? Did you noticed fewer wasps and hornets around?
, no reply from him. probably fake comment
Thank you for teaching us how to deal with wasps and hornets without hurting the bees!
🤣😂 wasps are just as important as bees, they eat the bad bugs that eat crops.... but, "KILL THEM ALL," because you're scared of them......
@@markbomberg2545🤦🏻
Wasps are natural to north America, honey bees are not.
@@gardencookeat22 We do have several invasive species of both wasp and yellow jackets in North America.
@ Cougar Ridge Ranch
We have and love hummingbirds. Is it safe enough?
Excellent advice, a rare commodity on TH-cam. Obviously you have thought this through since you’re a beekeeper. We have to presume this will work without harming one of the most endangered and valuable species of our lifetime. Thank you!
Exactly I have bees in the yard I like to keep around for the sake of my family’s plants but those damn wasps need to go! (Especially when they make their way into my room and wake me up by flying over my face🤣)
I own a small 150 acre ranch with a lot of buildings and barns and have had a wasp problem for a few years. I have been doing this all spring and have noticed a huge decline in their numbers. I put out these acid feeders then after a few weeks I put out some of the 2 liter traps and have just about taken care of all of them
The 2 liter traps to get them in and then drown them?
I want to try this
The fact that I can learn from Brad on the other side of the world is just amazing. Thank you for the great tips!!
Wow! Krzysztof, Thank You...
By the way where are you? That sounds like a polish name.
So it’s August 27th 2022. At this time of year in New England, I wasn’t sure if meat was still a viable option or if fruit was the better option for late summer so I set out a boric acid laced smorgasbord! I’ve only had yellow jackets visit the buffet that I’ve seen. Some bumblebees perished in the traps with sugar water. :( So here’s the results. They did go for the cooked chicken finely diced but they’re really going for the fruit/veggie purée that comes in the squeeze pouches. It seems to be basically applesauce with minimal other mixed in. They also are enjoying cheap dollar store strawberry soda. I’ve seen them fight over the purée. Just letting folks know who are finding this wonderful video now about some other great options. I’m using shallow lids from jars. Thank you, Brad! Great video!
I can confirm this. Many years ago I worked for a pest control company that would spray for ants indoors with non toxic spray for pets and children. I noticed the active ingredient was boric acid.
Yup, many, many moons ago a pest control guy told me this pseudo secret. I’ve used it for 40 years and decided to share it.
@@CaptainWingnut : I think thats the way it should be.
Sharing knowledge with our fellow man at no cost!
Thank You very much!
Hi Brad. Boric acid banned where in my country. Can u suggest an alternative please
@@maryduffy4843 Hi Mary. As an insecticide, there really isn’t a good alternative to boric acid.
Some say to use bicarbonate of soda or diatomaceous earth, but they don’t work the same way.
Boric acid disrupts the digestion process of an insect and then shuts down their nervous system.
Baking soda and diatomaceous earth kill insects by dehydration, drying them out.
All must be eaten by the insect to kill them.
Boron and its by products such as boric acid have been unscientifically banned in some countries as a poison due to some crazy studies where they fed mice unbelievably high quantities. By size ratio, humans could not consume that much. What they found was that it caused infertility in rodents at extremely high doses. Boric acid has been used as a medicinal supplement and still, more in a moment.
By the same science they could ban table salt, because if you eat too much it could kill you as well!
The most interesting fact to me is that boron and boric acid is in the soil, air and all around us!
Where can you get it? Try online. Its used as a dietary supplement (boron citrate) and perhaps you can get it that way (you’ll have to calculate the equivalency).
Also, I think you can buy boric acid vaginal suppositories around the world. They are typically 600-800mg of boric acid and are used as a vaginal stabilizer for bacterial vaginosis (yeast infection). You might need a prescription!! The medical data shows that no one has ever died from using them. Maybe, medically, they’re allowed where you live.
You would need approx 8 to make a tsp equivalent of boric acid powder.
Some have additional ingredients like aloe which would not change the outcome of your insecticide.
Good Luck, thanks for watching and subscribing.
@@CaptainWingnut Thank you so much. Great info. Will try and let you know. Love your easy delivery 👍
Always some kindly elderly chap who has all the answers!
Thank you Brad!!!
UR WLCM
This guy has a very relaxing way of talking. I think he would be a good storyteller.
When I moved into an apartment building in the NYC AREA, the place was loaded with both ants and roaches..I spread Boric Acid EVERYWHERE. In about 7-10 days, they were completely gone.
Another great success story... thanks for sharing.
A refreshingly thorough and down-to-earth video and creator!
Ahhh shucks. Thanks a ton. Thanks for watching and a wonderful compliment
And he didnt intentionally delay making his point until the very end. Rather jus started upfront, much appreciated.
I lost my entire blackberry crop for the last two years to wasps and hornets. I have yet to come upon a solution that would allow the wasps hornets to self exterminate the colony until seeing this. This solution is ingenious and insidious. I absolutely love it. Many thanks!!!
I’ve lost 3 years of blackberry harvest for the same reason. Did this work for you?
Hey, did it work?
4:20 for the mixing process...
Apple juice 1/4 gal (.5*.5=.25)
Boric acid 2 tsp
Make sure it is 100% boric acid.
(I noticed the bottle was half full, not half empty.)
Apparently sugar and boric acid are like catnip for wasps. It's wasp-nip
Great tag. Thanks
@@CaptainWingnut Yeah, just like cinnamon is catnip for bees, and in that instance, it's bee-nip
@@samsimington5563 You’re funny... you should make humor videos!!
@@CaptainWingnut I don't have all of the resources to make videos at all, plus it sounds like a lot of time consuming work, but you're right though, I should look into humer type stuff. I have a dad joke calendar ironically for Christmas recently
@@samsimington5563 i like human nip
We used to use it on ants, mixed with honey. I didn't know about the concentration affecting the speed of kill, though. I used a different method to wipe out the wasps nesting in a tree above my vege garden. 4 days later, my cabbages were utterly destroyed by cabbage moth. I learnt my lesson. A few wasps around, especially when they aren't bothering you, is not necessarily a bad thing
Wasps provide some valuable services. Besides killing bad bugs, like you mention, they also clean up road-kill and other organic garbage laying around.
The honey would attract and kill honeybees too. Not cool. Use sugar water instead.
@@edwardgrit3074 Agreed. But if you trying to kill ants in your home, the bees shouldn't get it to it. We had to kill a mess of sugar ants that kept coming through the power outlets and light switches. We made a honey boric acid mix and put it in soda bottle lids (plastic) and carefully slid them into the outlets and put the faceplates back on. There was plenty of room to place the lid without touching any wires. No more ants after a few days.
Yes, wasps are very valuable. They are pollinators and they eat pests that destroy gardens like leaf minors. They love caterpillars, but they also love caterpillars that are beneficial like from the monarch butterfly.
I hated wasps until I became an organic gardener. Now I welcome them. They have such a bad reputation unfortunately.
Wasps are good insects. Unless their nest is close-by they don't bother people and should be left alone. If their nest is in an inconvenient place then knock it down early in the morning quickly. They will build elsewhere and you won't see them again.
Thank you sir. Looking forward to trying this. I’m happy that I won’t be standing on a ladder with a sprayer around wasp nests. This seems like a safer alternative.
Really appreciate the information. Sometimes my family gets stung trying to build fence and repair fence. Those yellow jackets are relentless and keep stinging.
Thanks for the tips! I was attacked by a swarm last year while washing my car. I have grandchildren that play in my yard so I rather be safe than sorry.
Hope it helps. Remember “Common Sense” in everything.
Thanks for watching
@@CaptainWingnut is
@@tedbundy3664 "in" works in the context he used it.
I used to find the really big ants, take a stick and flick them into a medicine bottle filled with boric acid, shake it, then release the white ant so it could go back to the nest for a good cleaning, works like a charm. Plus you can watch the white dot as it heads towards home!
@Need2connect they were Carpenter ants
I dumped some jalapeno pepper juice in a wood ant hill n they cleared out😍
I have large red Harvester ants on my property, the only food for Horned Lizards, so I leave them alone. I want to try to get the State of Texas to release some Horned Lizards ( Horny Toad) here on my acreage. As far as the wasp, it’s WAR.
😂🤣🤣 I bet that's fun !
Because I'm sure someone will ask: Boric acid is essentially the same compound as borax, but significantly refined and purified.
Borax should do the same job in killing insects, but it's not as potent. For insects that actually eat it mixed into food (rather than just coming into contact with the powder and later grooming themselves) I suspect it will be good enough. It has to actually get inside the insect to kill it, and not all insects groom.
Borax was used as a detergent and for many other things a way back before other products mostly replaced it, so it's something you find in many an old garage and cleaning closet :)
When I heard you say "pop" can, brought me back to my Midwest roots😉
I remember reading years ago about a woman in Texas who when building her new home filled the walls with boric acid. She was that scared of cockroaches.
Hey, that was some smart thinking........never to worry about roaches, silverfish, earwigs, fleas, beetles, scorpions or spiders.
Atta' kid. Massive preemptive strike. Bet it works.
Filled her WALLS?
@@CaptainWingnut kills fungus and mold too, so she is set. And thanks for the tips and recipes, you make it very easy to replicate.
@@maxwellsmart3156 It’s an amazing mineral... so many uses... Thanks for watching and commenting.
In Australia, what you're calling hornets, they're known as European wasp's. Bloody mongrels of things.
Yeah, when they’re a onezie twozie you don’t notice them but when they get out of control and bloom,,, I don’t know if mongrels is a strong enough word...
Thanks for commenting.
Yes we call those wasps in the UK. Our hornets are fat monsters, nearly 2” long, giant wasps!
My dad used to make those traps with milk jugs filled with water, apple cider vinegar and a sprinkle of tuna fish. The tuna adds the protein that the hornet's and wasps require. My dad made a lot of them because his home has cedar siding and those insects love to bore into it.
Great comment.
Did he add boric acid also? Or does the vinegar kill the wasps?
No on the boric acid, the trap lures them and traps them inside, most just drown. You just fill the 2ltr and milk jugs 1/4 to halfway, keeps them upright and from blowing away
@@ivyleague3224 Add some boric acid and cure a temporary fix.
Hmm, I thought cedar was supposed to be an insect repellent?
Probably best idea I’ve seen on the issue so far thanks man
UR Welcome
Thanks for this! I have been meaning to up put several cans for the wasps in my area, but did not! ☹️. This morning as I was in the garden I noticed a plump Monarch caterpillar munching on a Butterfly weed leaf. I went to go get my husband to show him (we have a butterfly garden, but as of late not many caterpillars), but by the time I got back a big red wasp had knocked it down and had stung it. Gosh I felt so bad…if only I had put the mix up earlier! Lesson learned!
I have used the boric acid and powdered sugar for ants for years, works like a dream.
Thanks for the video letting everyone know. If you have red ants create a ring of the boric acid and powderd sugar around their main hills where the opening is.
Wow, great comment.
Yes, all you’d have to do is put boric acid powder around the hill and they’ll walk through it.
They’re social groomers so the colony will eat it and, viola, done and dusted!
Thanks for watching and subscribing...
@@CaptainWingnut Is it safe to do this if you have outdoor pets?
@@Red_Hairing Yes, but use common sense... you’re killing flying insects so put it where your outdoor pets (and unsupervised children) can’t get to it. The boric acid is way too weak to harm pets or children, but the WHY’s who feed on it will certainly protect and defend it with venom.
Thanks for watching and a great question.
Will this work with Fire Ants too?
Our Texas red ants are becoming extinct because of the fire ant colonies entering into their nests and annihilating them, I understand. I prefer red ants to fire ants anyday. We played side by side outside when Mom sent us out...to get out of her hair....no bad fire ants back then. I have an acquaintance who tries to preserve his one huge red ant bed on his property by surrounding it with protection from fire ants.
Yellow jackets are the worst and most painful stings I have ever exeperienced and that is from a person who used to be anaphalactically allergic to wasp stings. Thanks for put this on!
Thank YOU for watching... hope it brings you some relief.
@@CaptainWingnut They are certainly around me. I walked upon a nest that appeared to have been left and armadilloes had dug it up late this winter. Found a paper hornet's nest on a low hanging branch on my property winter before last. Thanks!
@@fomoyearsfofofiv8178 You’re right... I’m a beekeeper and get stung all the time by the bees and a yellow jacket is way more painful...
@@CaptainWingnut I was stung by 5 yellow jackets at once and it felt like the poison was slowly oozing down into the tissues of my legs with a feeling of being re stung again and again for about 8 hours. That was my particular experience with them. I actually get about 2 weeks of a europhoric pain relief with wasp stings these days. Not that I seek them out, but a total flip from how wasps affected me as a kid.
Yellowjacket stings are bad, but nothing compared to the sting of a tarantula hawk!
Thanks. We get a lot of wasps out here. I have only been stung once in my whole life, and it was this summer because they built a nest in our lawn decorations, and I didn’t think of the possibility. Well, the sting wasn’t that bad, but I sure hate having to be so cautious with everything. We have to knock down nests all the time on our clubhouse, under our pool deck furniture, on our deck, in our garage…it’s unreal. I am definitely going to try this. I bought some boric acid, and we always have juice and empty soda cans. Mama’s going to have a good time!💀💀💀😄
How did it go?
@@Beachedwhales237 it works wonders!
Keep in mind, Boric Acid is acidic. Borax is alkaline. Do not mix the two of those, or they cancel each other's acid/base extremes--that acidity or alkalinity is part of how they work. We've used Borax powder for decades to make this stuff. Alternately, I bot something called "Ants-B-Gone", that was made with Boric Acid and a "non-digestible sugar" [like artificial sugars, such as aspartame]. Making a syrup/nectar for them to eat, works slow in them, the gatherers take that nectar back to feed the queen and nest, they don't see anything sickly about the gatherers, so they also eat it...and the nest dies out instead of moving to new locations.
These two things will NOT deter rodents though. For that, we specifically use Pennyroyal as a spray. I've also spread cayenne pepper [bought in bulk], where rodents walk, and they hate it and leave....although, you do NOT want to do that where your pet cats or dogs might walk--they won't like it either, and will be in terrible distress from licking it off their paws. Neither is it safe for kids to walk on.
But borax has been safe for all kinds of bugs. Can stuff the powder under baseboards, under carpeting. We've even just sprinkled it thickly near a door where ants were trying to get in, and they left. That needed done for about 3 years in a row at this place, then they stopped coming.
We had annual carpenter ants here in the PNW, trying to make inroads at our kitchen door. By stuffing borax under the doorsill, and laying a thick line of it along the foundation under the door, they quit...just went way.
Another cheap, low-tech paper-wasp nest trick; Use brown paper lunch bag, blow it up like a balloon [kids can help]. Tie it off to hold that shape. Hang one of those in your eaves, near doors and windows. We have 2 in our front entry area, and a couple along the patio roof in back, and the paper wasps just look elsewhere to build, and stop bothering humans using doors and windows. CAVEAT: Ground-dwelling wasps ignore these--those guys are aggressive, and need to sip your recipes to get rid of those. Some will fight tenaciously against straight borax put at the entry of their nests--it took 3 summers to finally get rid of a huge next in our front garden--required a bee suit, LOTS of borax, and a shovel, to finally evict what was left of them---then their scouts have been trying to make nests behind window shutters...bad. Ground dwelling wasps in the PNW, are probably equals to the "murder hornets" that got here from Japan.
Boric acid has long been used by a few companies, to brush down into cleaned carpets, so it gets deep into the fibers and down into the pad. This deters all bugs that tend to like carpets [like fleas, ticks, mites]. Alternately, could try diatomaceous earth powder brushed deep into the carpets, but those are sharp tiny bits, that might damage the carpet. But a carpet treated like that using boric acid, is listed as safe for crawling babies and small pets like dogs, cats, because it is brushed so deep into the carpet.
Borax is your friend. So it Boric Acid. Especially if you live where bugs abound.
You have some good recipes!
Oh--Borax is also somehow good for helping a cob-type mix for plastering strawbale buildings..Years ago, I add about a couple Tblsp. of borax, a couple Tablesp. of a good waterproof white glue--wish I could remember the name of it; and added Pozolanic ash to that dirt + Portland mix, and the stucco came out fairly waterproof, fire resistant more than usual, and very sturdy.
Hey, I know it's a long time since you posted this message but I wanted to ask you if you were making the sugar water for these wasp traps using borax, how much would you use. I have borax but not boric acid and I have a wasp nest drilled into the cedar shakes right above my front door. My husband is deadly allergic to wasps. I tried spraying the nest with poison but they are still there. I want to try this. Please let me know.
@@oystergirl99 No problem! I comment on fossil posts & comments often!
I doubt wasps are only just between shingles-more likely, they found a nice pathway up into a larger space-like your attic? If so, you need a pest control person to eradicate those.
You don’t need both boric acid & borax--one is acid, other is alkaline…never use them together, cuz in this case, they cancel each other’s acid or base chemistry levels
The old “Ants-B-Gone” recipe from the old chemist, as near as I have made it:
Also known as “toxic nectar”:
1 cup water (or artificially sweetened cola), bring to simmer in a small pan.
Borax, 1 Tblsp. at a time, til it looks like no more will dissolve.
-OR- boric acid powder (NOT BOTH), added same way
Nutrasweet packets, a few. (Skip this if using artificially sweetened cola)
( fake sugars are toxic: nutrasweet, & acesulfame potassium, also printed as “Ace-k”, or other abbreviations; sucralose is next. There are others)
If a little more water is needed to dissolve particles of powders, add a little at a time…don’t want any more than necessary.
Once it’s all a kind of heavy liquid, store in a clearly-labeled bottle, safe away from kids & pets.
For most ants, just a bottle-cap full, placed in their path, or near nest entrance, usually does it.
This is not my recipe; it was invented by a chemist in Martinez, CA, around 40 years ago.
I only guesstimated it, & it’s been working.
Bottle trap to catch flies, wasps:
Use a pint water or soda bottle.
Cut top off, just below where body of bottle starts to narrow…creating a funnel shaped part from the bottle top.
Turn the funnel upside-down into the bottle, matching edge of funnel to edge of bottle body.
Use a big pin or finishing nail to poke matching holes in each, to tie them together with a twist tie, & to attach a hanging wire.
Add about 1/2 cup of the “toxic nectar” solution.
Flying insects can crawl down into bottle thru the funnel, but have very hard time crawling out-especially if clear bottle has facets that reflect light-the refracting light from sun confuses their vision.
And, when sun hits bottle, it heats up inside-also deadly for the insects.
If it dries, or fills with dead insects, you can either take it apart to clean & refill it, or, throw it away & make another. If there’s hordes of insects, can hang multiple bottle traps.
My DH donned a bee suit & aggressively pushed lots of plain borax into the big ground-wasp nest, 3 summers in a row, & soaked them with water hose, in turns.
It did finally get rid of them, but it harmed the lilacs, lavender, & other plants over it & nearby it…I think it was what helped kill our elderberry bushes, too…but those could have been from a root fungus or something…& other problems.
I don’t advise doing that, unless no other recourse.
Part of what helped that effort, too, was hanging bottle traps within about 4’ of the entrances to that nest….but because the opening was so big & multiple, it made using only bottle traps harder-because so many wasps could fly out to attack.
The opening in your shingles might be small enuf it only lets one or two in/out at a time??-so, a bottle trap might do it.
In the cool of early morning, or late evening, when your shingle-wasps are not active yet, you might try:
a mix of borax + nutrasweet, & maybe a bit of meat gravy to stick it together,
& stuff it into the wasp entrance using a stick (not your fingers!), enuf to block their entrance.
If enuf can shove into the hole, it can stop them getting in/out, & give them something to chew on that has calories….that might do the trick, too.
“Paper wasps” build papery-layered round nests glued up under the eaves.
They are territorial, so, if you hang a puffed-up brown lunch bag, tied at the neck & hung up under the eaves, before those start looking for nesting spots in spring-your fake nest brown bag will send them looking elsewhere.
I’ve had one hung by each door for yeeears…this is first year of seeing a nest near our door…in decades if using this.
But the ones just spotted, are a different kind of wasps…so, I’m keeping an eye on them….these guys look more like a kind of fly, but have built what looks like a paper wasp nest.
These don’t seem to fly out to attack-have not seen any of their “attack squads”.
These might be pollinator wasps or flies of some kind-we very much need pollinators-so, unless these act aggressive, I’ll leave them alone til cold weather, then remove the nest……
…..unless we get time to do a project there-than I’d put a plastic bag snugged around the nest, tighten it around the top, & scrape it from the wood…& take it way out back & stick it where those can’t hurt anyone
Wasps depend on flight-a simple 3-speed fan could interrupt their flight…which might make them quit that shingle nest…
..…point fan so it blows up & out from your door area…or across & out--so the wind interrupts their flight path right by their entrance.
They generally don’t fly at night, or in rain, or in heat of day….you might be able to timer the blowing fan to be on during morning, & from late afternoon til dark….that might be enough.
Hope that helps!
Tldr
@@macknumber9 Notice, it was not addressed to you, son of number9. .
It really is ok to scroll past comments that don’t interest you, or that confuse you.
Good morning from NC. I have Japanese hornet nest at the base of tree in back yard. What can I do to exterminate them without paying an exterminator? Ideas, please. I have borax.
Thank you! Your help means so much! Blessing on you and yours!!!
🙏
Started using this in August (early Spring here in New Zealand). I saw dozens of Queens every day for weeks coming for the mixture - thought it was never going to end. Didn't use cans - they didn't seem to like them - maybe the Queens were too big? So I used just lids from jars - sometimes with cotton swabs in them. Used for a multitude of bloody ants as well. Thought THEY were never going to end either lol. But after about 3 weeks, there were less and less and now in late summer (early February) - I haven't seen a wasp for ages. I still put out the apple juice mixture. And for the last couple of weeks an ant colony has arrived again - in my bathroom - and again it seems like it's getting worse - but I remember thinking this in spring after only a couple of weeks, so I'm expecting another week or so of the ants and then results. I thank you soooo much - wasps especially are a real problem in NZ and we're trying to eliminate them. THANKYOU 💜💜💜💜💜💜
So glad to hear great successes with my simple solutions...
Thanks for watching and subscribing.
Dadgum yellow jackets build nests in my scuppernong vines. Sooner or later I always get stung. Can't wait to spring this on them.
Show 'em the lightning Cindy
My mom is outrageously allergic to the little buggers? Maybe these ideas can help.
They wont be laughing now.
@@lilolmecj Ah, I’ve never heard them called “little buggers” but I guess they are little and they are bugs!! Just kidding!
i always found yellow jackets in the ground i have scuppernong vines never found any wasps in them yet i kill yellow jackets nest by pouring 1/2 cup gas into hole at night when they are all in the nest this is fatal
Thank you, so glad to find a way to rid the wasps without hurting the bees! It's good to know bees won't go for the diluted fruit juice because they want the good stuff! This sounds so much better than commercial pesticide poisons.
I have wasp swarming all over my chicken run. One of my hen suddenly died with no signs of illness or trauma. She was perfectly healthy the day before. I’m assuming the wasp attacked her. Yesterday I was stung by a wasp and it hurted so bad. I’m so glad I found your video! Thank you!!! 🙏
Thank you for posting this! We have dealt with yellow jackets for about 5 years. They have burrowed into our home three times creating lots of damage not to mention we have been stung repeatedly. They got so bad this year we were unable to enjoy our deck or patio space for fear of being stung. We have tried several methods to get rid of them. I will surely try your method. Thanks again.
Sorry to hear that. Yes they are insanely terrible here this year. We've had feeders out all summer... they don't want ANY sugar this fall... we've had success with tuna fish, but very watered down... they don't want the meat, just the juice off of it... we just keep adding water laced with boric acid to the tuna cans.
Good Luck
Great advice, and safe also.
Thank you for being here.
Hope it helps
I can not thank you enough for this video. I have a serious wasp problem but I have spent a decade making my property a haven for bees and the last thing I want to do is spray insecticides.
Thank you very much for teaching us how to get rid of wasps and hornets and leave the bees alone. I am blessed with bees that visit my garden and plants. Thank you very much indeed.
YW 👍
Try to make it easy for the hornets and wasps to consume the mixture and fly back to the nest. Why? The critters don’t consume the mixture themselves but feed it to the larvae in the nest that the queen lays. The larvae secretes a fluid that the critters consume for nutrition to stay alive. When the mixture is fed to the larvae they die so the food source for the hornets and wasps goes away too. The cycle is now broken.
Essential Tremor. I also have it. It runs in the family. You need a tripod that doesn't shake like your arm. The jiggling is enough to make a person seasick!
Dr put me on metroprolol several years back for tremor. Yeah, it’s got side affects, I’ll take the trade for the no shakes.
You can buy a tripod for not much...no rocket science necessary...
Mine is a crushed nerve, drugs don't touch it.
Thank you for putting detailed instructions in the description
Thank you for reading them... my father told me “Always read the instructions, even if you don’t intend to follow them”!!
Thanks for watching
Here's a true story that happened to me in 1980, at a house we were renting...
In the back yard, in an area of about 10' x 10', there was wall to wall cockroaches all over the ground. They were having a huge party. So I went to the store to buy 3 cans of RAID. I sprayed (I soaked) every cockroach in the yard... literally 100s of thousands of cockroaches. I figured, there would be dead cockroaches everywhere, the next morning. I checked it out the next day, and there wasn't a single dead cockroach on the ground. They went home. RAID was a waste of time and money.
Here is a true story about a house I purchased:
It was wall-to-wall flies.
Instead of bopping individual flies then sweeping their corpses, I got them with the vacuum cleaner.
As I slowly slid the schnozzle toward them, their tiny feet dug in, their tiny wings fluttered, then... suddenly, they just disappeared.
Like magic, but more fun!
Chemical sprays are never good. Diatomaceous esrth works as well as boric acid.
Back from the dead!! lololol that's a very sad story lolol
I've been using boric acid for decades but found out that in MANY places you can be charged with manufacturing a pesticide without a license so maybe don't let everyone know what you are up to! They can really hurt you with fines and jail time when they want to be pricks about it. Boric acid, peanut butter and icing sugar is a great one for roaches, they love it and take it home to share, but of course making that where I live is a crime so I would never do it myself, never!
Buy Borax for laundry. same thing
😆
Most people don’t really understand how the laws work, I graduated Suma Cum Laude and worked in law for 20 years... Each law has elements or requirements and you have to break ALL of the elements to fulfill the law to get to the punishment section.
If all of the elements are not met, no crime has been committed.
SELLING the finished product is required to complete the elements of that crime... no one’s selling it here.
@@CaptainWingnut hmm interesting 🤔 . Thanks ☺️
I moved into a dump about 3 years ago now. The german roaches were like sheets on the walls, in cabinets. It was a living nightmare. I made this massive bowl of the boric acid, powdered sugar, and 2 boiled eggs and put it everywhere. Haven't seen a roach in 3 years. Now the hornets and wasps on the other hand are taking us out here. Our walls outside are like overwhelmed and they come in all the time freaking us out!! So, I am going to try this right here!!! Thank you so so so much!
Thanks for watching
Thanks for sharing this with us I've had a wasp and hornet problem for a long time and now I can get rid of them one and for all
Thank you for this method - I was worried about getting the good bees so haven't used juice. Now I can try the pop can method. We found they're after protein in the Fall, and that's when they're most aggressive as well so I use meat for the bait. Also, when I find a starter nest in Spring, I spray it with the cleaner "Simple Green". Instant kill. If they're flying they drop out of the air. I even sprayed out a nest under the eaves of my house.
Spring is the best time to put this out.
Every W.H.Y. flying is a QUEEN... so everyone that drinks the mixture is a colony "nest as you call it" that will die.
Is Borax mule team the same as boric acid?@@CaptainWingnut
@@introserveonlinereviews4648I think you want 100% boric acid. Borax isn't the same thing.
Very helpful. And thanks for taking the time to type it up. That made it easy to transfer your suggestions to a 'to do' list. I subscribed.
I've got these European hornets and I can't wait to start these tomorrow!!! Thank you for sharing!!!!
Did it work?
Thanks for the helpful tips! We appreciate your advice.
YW and thanks for watching
Ditto
Good idea ! But all animals and insects play a part in the balance of ecology which mankind is the latest "Disruptor"of!
Be careful as Bees are not the only Pollinators in The World and imagine how long it would take us to replace them so we can have food to eat!
I Don't want to be Stung but I would place some Apple juice at least 5ft from my picnic
so they join us at a separate table!
@@martinfontana3593 While I honestly appreciate your take on this issue I might add that having milk weeds and any kind of flowers will draw honey and bumble bees to your property and they are not as aggressive as Hornets and wasps are. For the last 3 years we have allowed milk weeds to grow wild here and mowed around them and they came around and haven't left. We have a TON of honey bees and bumble bees that come here every year since so we dont have any issues with pollination. Hopefully, if you are having an issue with that this will help a little bit at least. Plus, if you have a garden dont forget that YOU can pollinate the plants by hand. Weve also done that and been very successful with our little garden crops.
Brilliant! Thank you!
Some insects like sugar, some like protein and others like both. I have found putting some egg shells in a plastic bag put some boric powder and sugar mix. Shake the bag. Distribute the egg shells around your property . For outdoors you can place the egg shells in upside down containers held up by a stake so the rain does not get inside. You can also use egg white in other custom made containers that are water proof.
Great advice, thank you! I've been looking for different ways to keep these hateful wasps away and not hurt the bees and also not use a ton of chemicals bc we also have animals that I don't want hurt.
Thanks Lacey.
Boric acid used to be the standard chemical for commercial pest control. One retired guy who had a huge pest control business in California (over 100 trucks) said they used to use this exact recipe (this is where I got it) exclusively for crawling insects. He said it was so effective that they didn’t get call backs to re-treat so the industry moved to other chemicals that weren’t so long term effective. He also told me, and I never researched it, that the chemicals that they use today are worse in toxicity than boric acid.
I have another response posted where I break down just how diluted this is on the toxicity scale.
Thanks for your reply.
@@CaptainWingnut I think the big online delivery place docked my reviews because of an industry grievance. I might have posted a recipe...they hate when the secrets get out. I don’t want strangers and their chemicals traipsing near me.
@@lolodee3528 Sorry to hear that they censored you.
I just got my boric acid today I am going ot get this made up and get it out in my front yard...praying it works,I have a ton of these little buggers this year .thanks for the info...
I am right with you!!! Good luck Mrs. Davis!!!
Good luck to both of you’s...
I've got red wasps that love to loiter around my cameras on my house which constantly set them off and fill up my video storage with nothing but video clips of wasp butt. I've formally declared war on them by sticking my head out of my front door and yelling in front of my neighbors who weren't aware of what was happening "THIS MEANS WAR!!" to no effect. I learned regular spray wastes time and money so with this information on boric acid, I'm headed to Wal-Mart. Thank you. I'm confident the tides of war are about to change in my favor.
Great Video, Sir.
One small thing ---- the yellow and black insects are Yellow Jackets and are found throughout North America (even up to my house in Alaska). There are similar and other versions like Bald Faced Hornets and both in-ground and above ground Yellow Jackets but they all die from the Boric Acid.
The interesting thing about ants and yellow Jackets is that they are cannibalistic and so that is one reason it takes a while for the entire nest to die-off.
I have used Sodium Borate ( 20 Mule Team Borax --- NOT Boraxo and certainly not Boric Acid --- ) with table sugar for ants and it has worked exceptionally well in Northern Idaho - where we have a lot of ants. - Joe -
Very good... yes all of those come from Boron and are all deadly to insects.
@@CaptainWingnut Just to make sure I'm understanding you correctly...
Borax and Boric Acid work *equally well* against wasps?
Is there any reason to search out boric acid if I already have borax on hand?
@@bernardkung7306 nope
I second the sugar/boric acid mix. They all leave your affected area and go to the mixture. Next few day mostly gone.
Hummingbird feeder is ant free with a smaller container of the sugar/boric acid at the base. I use a COTTON BALL as a wick. They just go nuts eating it.Termites hate boric acid too.
This is genius! I was thinking about knocking down the nest to get rid of my problem but you have saved the danger from me doing that and also got to the root of the problem. I will definitely be trying this out.
I have a white faced hornets nest on the side of my house about six feet away from a window that is always open this time of years so that the cats can go in and out as they please. Only two of them have actually come into the house as far as i know. One of them died on a kitchen counter, and am not sure why. The other one i thought was dead floating in a bowl filled with water in the sink. I scooped it out with a spoon and noticed it was still alive. I could have just washed it down the sink, but decided to just toss it out the window where it could possibly recover and rejoin the hive. If it has any intelligence it will know that coming in the house is not the safest place to go.
That nest has been there for a few weeks, but i just noticed it a couple days ago. I am out there frequently doing yard work and hanging out with the cats. I have never even seen any of the hornets fly anywhere near me. So far, i have been leaving them alone and they have been leaving me and the cats alone. They have been doing their thing which is probably hunting other bugs in my yard and working on their hive. At this point, i am not really sure what i will do about it. I just might try this method instead of directly confronting the nest.
By the way, did you try it? Did it work for you?
Your awesome! Been doing pest control for 15 years and ppl ask about natural ways to control issues and that’s on my list now..
If you’re currently in pest control, this so good, it is a job killer for pest control!!
A friend of mine years ago worked for a large pest company and they weren’t allowed to use this because it was so long term...
We had a serious ant problem inside our house this spring. I tried all sorts of comercial products but they did nothing. Then I recalled how we got rid of a carpenter ant infestation a couple decades ago so I knew just what to do. I sprinkled diatomaceous earth, sometimes with powdered sugar, usually not, around my yard, doors, cracks in the foundation and anywhere else ants could possibly be getting in and the problem disappeared virtually instantly. Haven't seen a single ant in my house since.
How did you get the carpenter ants to take up the diatomacious earth , did you mix it with sugar and water to make a can trap like this video, or just use it dry mixed with sugar? Did you have to put it in their burrow holes directly? (I thought they eat the wood?)
@D M I used a commercial product that came in a special squeeze bottle with a spout to put through the holes in the wall. It was decades ago, so I'm not certain, but I believe it was called "Bug-b-Gone". The powder would fly out when you squeeze the bottle. TBH, I have no idea what was in there besides the DE.
When I use DE to get rid of ants these days, I mix a little icing sugar into it. Not much, though. About a teaspoon per cup. A single application last summer took care of the problem for months. I normally apply it twice per summer.
I tried that and the ants just walked through it
@Susan Trice It takes a little while to kill them. Not very long, though. DE feels like a soft powder to us, but it's actually made up of billions of tiny skeletons of ancient marine organisms. It has many sharp edges and points on each tiny piece. It cuts and pokes holes in the ant's exoskeletons, and they die of dehydration. It also clings to their bodies and goes back home with them.
If they eat it or actively carry some home, thats just a nice bonus.
If you would like to hit them with a double blow, mix some half and half borax and icing sugar and sprinkle some of that on top or beside the DE. Just a bit, though. You don't want to cover all the DE.
You aren't likely to kill off the entire colony outside of the house; however, once all the scouts who go into your house start dying, there won't be many more following their scent trails in there.
If there's a colony inside your walls, you have to "spray" lots of it directly into all the areas they have infested. That means, drilling several holes into each wall and using a special bottle with a tip you can stick into each hole and then you squeeze the bottle a few times to blow DE around behind the wall.
I never understood why my dad didn't like cotton candy, and then he told me the story of when he went to some fair when he was a little kid with my grandparents. He got some cotton candy on a stick and was enjoying it as most little kids do, only to bite some that a hornet had found first. Needless to say, but that hornet tore up the inside of his mouth.
Guess now I know...
(Love and miss you Pop!)
I'll have to show this to my grandfather because the lake house gets infested on the outside by yellow jackets on the summer and my 6 year old nephew always gets stung.
Thank you, good sir!
Oh, glad to be of assistance. Good Luck and thanks for watching.
We live on a lake as well and the yellow jackets are everywhere. My small dog accidentally stepped on a nest on the way to our dock, his head was covered with them, seven of us also got stung. I grabbed my dog up and we all ran and hit the water. I hate them! We also have Cicada killer hornets this year. They are terrifying!
@@KnowEyes When we first moved into the mountains the WHY’s were terrible and thick… they killed two of my honeybee colonies…
I put this out and taught my neighbors (who are distant) and it took about 3 years until we had tamped down enough that their numbers are not big enough to dare to take on a honeybee colony. I also got what I think are Russian honeybees who are real nasty and fight hard against them… they’re almost pure black and extreme over producers of honey, but they are the girls with attitude. My sister calls them “X” Factor bees. Where I used to work them with bare hands and arms and in shorts with just a veil, I now have to be in long pants, and full bee suit…
The comment from Ian is correct. I read on tube the the wasps are predators and collect food for the larve. which in turn provide an excretion that the adult wasps feed on. After summer and the food source dies off , the wasps turn to sweet. Which explains why you see them at picnics, cook outs, etc. Everything has a bit of good/bad.
The camera is shaking because the last ant allowed on the property agreed to be the camera guy :)
NAHHHH! The camera “guy” was my healer Apollo… he was distracted with a “Squirrel”
@@CaptainWingnut 😂
Whenever you're mixing up concoctions into drinks bottles, do put a sticker on top of the label just to warn others what is inside ìt. Or masking tape over their printed label and write over the top.
Really?
Really, what?
Isn't it common sense not to poison other people? Safety #1. Label it.
I don’t think boric acid in these amounts is overly toxic to humans or animals. That being said, the first thing I did when I got back from the grocery store was to firmly tape a post it note on the apple juice container saying, “Bottle contains boric acid and DO NOT drink any of the juice in this container. It’s for our wasp friends” 😂
Good video - thank you. FYI - regarding the mix ratio of apple juice to boric acid, your container of apple juice is a 3 quart, not a gallon container .
I just have one suggestion. Take the label that says apple juice off of that bottle and put it with skull and crossbones on it in case you ever got children around and they thought that was apple juice... ;-)
First:
Great idea for people who have idiot children running around loose.
I'm all about common sense for your own life purposes. It's no longer my job to tell people how to think logically with common sense or otherwise, but I'm constantly reminded that some people can only do what they're told and others can only run about ringing alarms that something might happen.
My disclaimer is and has always been: This is what I do, ALWAYS use your own common sense.
Second:
Find my scientific response regarding if someone were to drink this potion and how diluted the borax or boric acid is, and
Third:
On our ranch, if a child is clever enough to get past the dogs and the stinging honeybees, but dumb enough to think that a jug hanging from a tree in the bee yard (out of reach I might add) with flies, wasps and hornets all over it is "apple juice", they're not really children, they're aliens.
Okay so my grandfather grew up next to Skinwalker ranch and our ranch is 35 miles due west of that, and we do have strange unexplained anomalies here too, so perhaps some aliens might masquerade as children and have no clue of the warning signs, but they've still gotta get past the dogs, the bees and the ranch hands!
Keep those darn kids off your lawn for good 😂🤣🤣
@@CaptainWingnut Great response ! 😂
@@CaptainWingnut yeah, back when I was a kid 50's-60's never once heard of a kid chugging some horrible smelling liquid. People today are afraid of everything and the mask wearing bs proves that.
@@bobbys4327 😂
I have a wasp nest somewhere near my balcony. Sit out there every morning for six or seven years. They know I'm there. I know they're their.
Never been stung once.
It only really happens when you dont notice them and end up grabbing one on a chair that you didnt see, or sitting on it etc...my mom was stung on the lip after drinking from a can she left out
"They're their" Illiterate people should refrain from commenting.
@@slapshot197 got it right the first time... but wrong the second? lol
@@TalkingGIJoe They're over there and they said their potato was cooked!
Thank you new beekeeper here.
Pure sugary soda pop, tuna, hamburger, tuna & vinegar, etc. There are tons of comments here of different baits people use at different times of the year. I notice that early in the spring they go for sweet. Mid summer they go for protein (same with ants) and late summer early fall they’re back to sweet. I usually put out 7-10 jugs, each with a different bait to cover the gambit. I just noticed yesterday, they’ve been avoiding the apple juice and eating the tuna & vinegar.
Watch their behavior and see what they’re searching for it possible. That may give you a clue. Otherwise, try many different baits...
They’ve got to eat, just figuring out what is is they want at the particular time of year, in your particular area is the test.
Good Luck and thanks for watching wisdom from knowledge.
What a great comment “@Conspiracy Discernment”. Just a note to a new beekeeper. Always watch your bees behavior before using this.
We were very hot and dry for 6 weeks and I had to take my WHY feeders down as my bees wanted ANY water they could get and I didn’t want them taking the boric acid laced water back to the honey mills. We’ve had monsoon rains daily now tor 3 weeks but I see my bees are still taking water from the dog bowls, bird baths and buckets with rain water, so it will still be a few weeks before I can put the lightning back out for the WHY’s. On a brighter note, I seldom see a WHY right now anyway, but that doesn’t mean they won’t migrate in with the smell of honey in the air.
Thank you so much when I'm trying to wash my car in the driveway they are all over the place bothering me.
👍
And make sure no little kids think its soda in the can and try drinking it! Wrap a piece of masking tape around it and tell them not to touch it.
Soda the is slow acting poison for people
@@Rogerabushh Well, I'll just throw this out here for what it's worth: My Mom will turn 101 years old in August. Her favorite drinks are coffee and Pepsi and she drank them all her life and still does. So I'm of the opinion that although you may be right about it being a slow acting poison, its slow enough that I won't concern myself over it. I'm 67 and my sister is 78 so there's that.
@@Craigx71
🤣🤣🤣🤣😁
@@Craigx71
Leave people alone!
Thank you sooooooo much!! I have tried everything to rid our yard of wasps and nothing has worked until I found your video. Within days of using your recipe the wasp’s where gone.
A recent comment the person said they put it out and never saw WHY’s at the can but they disappeared anyway. They removed the cans and within weeks the WHY’s were back making nests… the cans come back out. I too see them on the ranch pestering the honeybees. I re-energized my hanging jugs with new mixture and while I never see WHY’s at the jugs, within a week I find no more pestering the honeybees.
Thanks for a positive comment.
New Subscriber. Great info; I was concerned about bees being affected, good to hear it's safe for them. Thanks!
Yup. I was up working with the bees today, putting on honey supers and they’re having nothing to do with the tainted nectar in the jugs and we haven’t seen a wasp or hornet around the bees since we brought them out of winter quarters 2 months ago.
This guy needs to go after those giant Asian hornets that are killing honey bees….
I'll go after them.... just waiting for them to come to my state !
I think you mean African
@@johnrice1943 www.nytimes.com/2020/05/02/us/asian-giant-hornet-washington.html
Can't say African then you gotttta pay them and let em steal at CVS fer free
@@bobbyyoung7836 🤣🤣🤣🤣
Left 4 cans out for about 9 hours and they didn't even touch it. Also had a 2 liter bottle trap with just plain Sprite and they didn't go near that either. I'm going to add raw chicken or maybe cat food into all of them tomorrow and will update if I have any success. It's really strange though, I remember as a kid we always covered our soda cans right away because they would be drawn to it instantly...my sister actually drank one before and learned the hard way. Makes you wonder about all these genetically engineered mosquitoes and God knows what else they're releasing out there...
Shout out to this guy over 2 years later still repling to comments with helpful advice
Thank you. We have a pool and there's always wasps flying around. My kids don't want to get into the pool mostly because of the wasps. Heading to the dollar store. 👍
Did it work ?
The best way to determine when you should start using these in spring is to look for two main signs that will trigger new queens to start building nests for the season.
1) Four straight days where the low temperature is 42 or more degrees
2) Look for flower growth in the area, while the queen will be mostly gathering protein from insects to get the first generation of workers up and running, she still has to sustain herself as well and adult wasps do not eat protein they eat sugar.
Yellow jacket colonies are pretty difficult to spot through spring and even much of summer, because during these times food is abundant and the foragers generally don't have much interaction with humans as they are so busy gathering food and tending to the brood.
Their aggression levels are not so high until around the last week of September-Early October where they are relentless pests as the queens have left the nest seeking out hibernation spots, meaning no new brood is in the nest to feed the adult workers, adult yellow jackets get much of their food from the young larvae who secrete a sugary substance.
So basically the queens leave the nest, food becomes scarce, aggression levels go way up until the adult worker population starves to death which by late season means thousands of yellow jackets and it can take them weeks to die off.
The problem with just killing them off is that you may see a spike in other pest insects such as moths or even worse flies, these are insects that you will not have much luck with controlling using boric acid, it is probably better to allow Yellow Jacket colonies to exist around your property from late March-Late July/Early September before eliminating them, as by that time they will have greatly checked local pest populations for the season while not being overly annoying toward the human population.
Thank you for your insights! Quite frankly, there are so very many around here, I doubt killing them *all* is a concern ;-). The wasps and yellowjackets have been in & around this house for fifty years, probably some big nest locked between the walls :: ugh :: when it was built in the 70s. Back then they just slapped stuff together, and if they did it fast enough, it wouldn't bug the workmen. Uh ...
@@HighLevelNinja If you live in the South or somewhere where there isn't really a winter season my advice won't apply, we have a yellow jacket season here in WV during spring/summer but because they die off in the fall there are no super nests here that takes long periods of time in a constantly warm environment.
I felt good when you said take an old pop can. Yes sir your right, it's a pop can. I moved 45 mins south 8 years ago and I stand alone in my area as the only man who drinks pop. We don't have "soda" in my home. We're a pop drinking house.
Just started this trick today. A few weeks ago we went after an underground yellow jacket nest that was about the size of a lawnmower with shovels and a makeshift flamethrower and protective bee suits. We unearthed a lot of their nest and burned it, but it seems we didn't quite get it all. I bought some apple juice and boric acid yesterday and mixed with it water in a red solo cup with some small twigs poking out from the top. I'll get back in two weeks to share the results :)
After having the mixture out there for about two weeks, I noticed there was no effect on the yellow jackets. I may have put far too much boric acid into the mix and they may have decided it tasted bad. I decided to just go ahead and dump gasoline down into their nest and lit it on fire.
@@Sr_Meowmers That’s good to know. Thank you.
Any chance you have video of the inferno? 😍
@@shellyd9287 I don't, sorry. It was just a quick flash and it was over. I kind of think the fumes from the diesel alone was enough to kill them, as by the time I was ready to light it, all activity had already stopped.
@@Sr_Meowmers I think that's usually what you're supposed to do. Just the gas. No fire. From what I've seen online.
Thank you so much! You've saved me having to call a pest removal company!
Oh yeah, DIY is the way to go if you know the cheap secrets...
Good on you.
Thanks for watching... make sure you subscribe and hit notify as I’ve got a ton more common sense vids coming.
@@CaptainWingnut
🙏😘😘😘🤗🤗🤗😂
I’m trying this!
I’m in south Spain and have such a lot of wasps this year we even got a professional to spray and remove the nests. He removed 6 large nests BUT we still have loads of wasps!!!
I’m hoping it works as well here as it does in The States 🤞
I remember having a little orange soda left n a can and later the wasps were all over it.. I didn't know the boric acid trick back then, but they sure like the sweet syrupy taste of orange soda..thx for the tip..
Awhile back I was way back in the woods and I grabbed a swig of my canned Mountain Dew and a hornet had flown into it. Stung me right on the top lip. I jus thank God I didn't swallow him.
Wow.. I guess he liked Mtn Dew also...I hope u got even with him...
@@garyjones2582 😁Ya he didn't make it but if that big ol sucker had stung me in the tounge or throat I might not have. I ain't ever left my drink open since then
@@BM205 Wise choice my friend.. thx again for posting 📫 the video...
I think that most of these videos are intended for people that have infestations this man is obviously a beekeeper so I think he has respect for nature in general
Last year, this worked great! It worked this spring as well. But this summer I noticed they had a nest up again. I put out more and they didn't take the bait! I did use the boric acid for roaches, so I will look for the pure boric acid and try again.
Good informational video Brad.
I also appreciate all the additional info you took the time & effort to type into your description summary. Thanks!
**For the bugs that think you speak to slow, tell them to try bumping their playback speed up to 1.25 in the settings cog.
Thanks for the comment...
When I was a rat, living in the rat race, I spoke fast and furious. When I retired and moved to the country I was able to slow down. I can speak fast and furious but nowadays, I chose not to. The ranch animals don’t care.
It’s so sad that more and more people are so judgmental and critical of each other today.
If you’re not perfectly scripted, don’t have perfect cameras, sound and fancy Hollywood editing effects, they feel like they’re being jipped.
Everyone has this wayward concept that they are in competition with everyone for everything.
Fewer and fewer people think of others and “pay it forward” and conversely more and more people are very selfish thinking only of themselves.
It’s just a sign of what I call the “fast food society”.
Drive up, order a burger, drive to the next window, pay and get your burger... drive away eating as you drive. No waiting.
People want it now... not in 10 seconds...not in 1 min. The tolerance level of people today is down to seconds. How long does it take you to cook a burger? Yeah, right. Everything in life has a cost and more and more people want someone else to pay the cost for them.
People pass you on the road just to turn off the road as soon as they pass...
This impatience is causing massive stress on people and they don’t realize that they probably won’t live to be as old as I am.
Slow down, smell the roses. You don’t have to go through life in competition with everyone and every thing.
You’ll die of stress related illnesses long before your time and the sun will still come up again in the East and set in the West.
@@CaptainWingnut
Great words of wisdom & observations of the world around us Brad.
Personally, I'm none too thrilled with the ways of the inconsiderate, hurry-up, point & click, world it's become.
I'm grateful I'm not a young kid growing up in this society with a whole lifetime ahead of me.
I'm probably even more grateful that I'm not a parent raising a kid these days.
I very much envy the life you've been able to make for yourself...you're basically living my dream.
I have a feeling you & I would probably get along great.
Thanks again for sharing...
@@kailarsen6148 Thanks for the positive comment. Yes life out here is tough but very rewarding. Right now we have cougars hunting deer on the property and I just had to reprimand a grandchild not to walk around in the trees without an armed adult present. We’ve never had a bad incident, but theres always a first. We have had the big cats stalk kids even with an adult present but a warning shot usually makes the point.
@@CaptainWingnut
Yeah, none of those big cats are anything I'd want to tangle with...they are very tough and need to be respected.
I suppose about all you can do is try to be super aware of what's around you and take all the proper precautions.
I'm a big animal lover but I know they don't all love me back the same way, so I'm willing to give them all the space & respect they need to struggle for life in their "fight for survival" world.
It's nature, but hopefully there aren't so many that things get too dangerous for you...especially after dark...YIKES!
Have a safe Memorial Day weekend Brad!
@@CaptainWingnut
Hey Brad, I hope you are still safe & well.
I'm back with a question for you about an excessive fly problem I'm having this year.
I've had hornets just about every year so I was anticipating using your "Boric Acid In A Pop Can Trick" this year.
For some reason the hornets haven't really been a problem this year but I've had an abundance of Flies around.
I was just wondering if you could share any technique you may have for eradicating an excess fly problem?
The dang things are making it miserable to be outside and impossible to enjoy the patio & backyard, THANK YOU SIR!
Thank you so much Brad for the helpful information. You are quite an intelligent person and also an humble man. My hat is off to you sir. I am definitely going to try your procedure. Here in south Georgia we have a terrible problem with fire ants and I hope this procedure will help to control them. We also have a generous supply of wasps and hornets. Thanks again for the help and keep up the good work.
Let me know how it works on Fire Ants… also watch my other video on killing ants th-cam.com/video/FU8rAKipXVY/w-d-xo.html
Speaking of boric acid ... living in a 20 story Apartment building in the heart of a big city, at least a couple of times a month, when entering
my kitchen in the dark and turning on the light, to my horror I would see a roach caught in the light, running like hell.
Even though WE did not have roaches nor did the majority of our neighbors, every once in a while, unknown to us, one or more nearby neighbors
apparently would get roaches and covertly spray their apartments ... causing the roaches to run for cover ... unfortunately to nearby apartments.
Mine included!
This happened a couple of times a month over a decade!
To make a long story short, we just so happened to plan on redoing our kitchen.
A friend of mine once said that boric acid kills any roaches that come in contact with it.
After ripping out all of the kitchen cabinets right down to the floor, I purchased a small can of boric acid ... about half the size if a can of Comet ... equipped with a sprinkle-top ... just like the Comet.
The cabinets came in. I washed the kitchen floor wall to wall. After dry, I sprinkled a generous amount of the powdered Boric Acid first completely around the periphery of the room where th floor meets the walls. The after tracing where the cabinets would cover the floors ...
I sprinkled that whole area too.
We then carefully brought in and installed the cabinets.
That was 30 years ago ... and we NEVER HAD ANOTHER ROACH IN MY KITCHEN SINCE THEN. NOT ONE!!
The funny thing is we have never had any insect in the kitchen at all since then. Not even flies in the summer like we used to have.
No more cobwebs in the corners, no moths flying in ... NO NOTHING!!
In my other video “KILLING COCKROACHES & ANTS PERMANENTLY
th-cam.com/video/FU8rAKipXVY/w-d-xo.html
There are many testimonials of people living in huge apartment complexes and after putting out boric acid religiously, the entire building becomes roach free… its a wonderful mineral.
I’m gona try this ! Thanks I looked all over town for Boric Acid no one carried it. Not even Canadian Tire or the local Hardware store. But I found some Borax at the grocery store. I’m going to try it.
Way to go... send 'em packin'
Dianne, did the Borax work?
@@AdamRasmussenAstronaut it’s not Hornet season yet but I tried it on ants. It was not that affective for the ants but I did try and make a paste and puncture hole in the lid of a small canning mason jars and filled them with a borax paste of sugar and honey and the put them on their side and put them everywhere I saw ants and it worked well for ants. And it was waterproof so its lasting a long time . And very effective . But your method works great I’m sure for hornets and wasps 👍
@@AV1611-truth thanks for replying, Dianne. I’ll have to try it out. I had read the Borax didn’t work. Sounds like proof is in the pudding and you got it.
Glad I found this video. I need to find some boric acid and then I'm totally doing this. I just got stung the other day, as wasps have a nest under my ramp to the rear door of my house, and I didn't know. My leg felt weird for a few days after the pain went away. My kid had a friend over too, and he got stung around the same area. I don't have a bee suit or anything to attempt lifting the ramp out of there, though I did put out a trap. But this seems like an even better idea, to me.
I cannot wait to give this a go. Not only is there a bad problem with yellow jacket hornet but also the bald faced aggressive monsters as well as paper wasps. I don't know if the fires we had stirred them from their homes, but I can't even go outside to enjoy the weather. I have all kinds of traps out and they are full but no relief from their sheer numbers. I will let you know how it goes.
These are such prolific insects that I don’t think that enough people could do this to really put a serious dent in their population.
I’ve kept these traps out from March to October for years. When we first came to the ranch their numbers were seriously scary and they knew they had the power to just take over. Now we only see a few throughout the summer but as fall comes on we always see an influx, especially around the beehive colonies. That’s when I pull out the big guns and put out a LOT of feeders, even right next to the beehives as you see in the video. I alway stay and watch to make sure no honeybees want to sip the swagga and after a nice 20min rest just watching, when I see that the only takers are hornets and wasps, I’ll leave. I come back daily to fill the pop cans being very careful not to alert the wasps and hornets in the cans as that can have consequences, but after about 3-5 days, the wasps and hornets are gone from the beehives and the bees calm down without the constant threats and bombardment.
Thanks for watching and good luck and don’t forget to use wisdom (common sense) in all that you do.
New sub here!
Great advice ! Thanks for posting bro! Is there a way to get the microphone a little closer to you the sound is low on my iPad. 🇺🇸✌🏻️
Hi Alan, Sorry about the sound volume.
I just ordered a separate wireless mic to fix that issue.
I made this video at the request of some friends and didn’t expect it to explode like it has.
I’m grateful for everyone like you who get something out of it and support my efforts to teach things I was taught many moons ago.
Also, I made this video on an old PC with old video software. It didn’t do very well and couldn’t boost sound or stabilize video.
I think it took over 18 hours to render and crashed the PC often.
I recently bought a Macbook Pro and added Final Cut Pro X, Apple Motion, Pixelmator Pro, Photoclip and a few others.
I have a DJI Mavic drone and love it so I just bought a DJI Osmo Mobile 2 to help stabilize my hand held work with my iphone.
The Mac is blast fast at rendering and the software allows me to boost sound and stabilize my shaky video better.
I’ve got a ton of film in the can - so to speak, of other things, it’s just getting the quite time to sit at the Mac now, learn new software and knock out some more vids.
Thank you very much for your support and comments.