Above ground wasp nest in Farmingdale, NJ

Recently, I was in Farmingdale, NJ performing a residential servicing for a homeowner who had a carpenter ant infestation. While I was treating around the exterior foundation and windows of a split-level home, I observed a yellow jacket nest. While we come across hornet hives and paper wasp nests every day, finding an above-ground yellow jacket nest is unusual. Yellow jackets often nest in underground cavities, often in rodent burrows or from other burrowing animals like groundhogs or moles. Sometimes, you’ll even see yellow jacket nests in tree cavities. But it’s rare indeed to find a yellow jacket nest built above-ground like they did here. 

Yellow jackets are among the nastiest of all stinging insects. They are aggressive and highly territorial, and won’t hesitate to sting if they feel there nest is being threatened. They wear their warning coloration as a badge of honor! Needless, to say, these yellow jackets were none too pleased that I was near their nest, and I could already see them become agitated. The key with a yellow jacket infestation is to treat them quickly and decisively. 

I applied a dust application to the entry point, quickly covering all of the insects inside the nest. Once the signal is sent out that the nest and queen are in distress, the foraging yellow jackets outside become highly aggressive. As they enter the nest and come into contact with the product, they too will die. It takes a few hours for the hive to become completely inactive, and at this time I’ll remove it. One particular problem with yellow jackets is that they leave markers and return to the same location the following year to nest. It is imperative to use the proper product and remove all remnants of activity so they permanently abandon the nesting spot, and move on elsewhere — and any nesting spot fine as long as its not on your property!