THINGS
WASPINATOR
The Waspinator is available on Amazon
So my summer of fun is under threat. On a recent trip we stayed with some friends for a few nights who have a lovely house and garden and pond. On night one, the children were near the pond feeding the resident duck when The Dog ambled over, saw The Duck and promptly barked at it. This had the unfortunate effect of alarming the wasps who had seemingly built a nest near the pond and made them come out, chasing after the children and attacking them. They all had at least 5 stings each. Even The Dog got stung in her tail - the wasps were particularly aggressive. My Child had one on his ear that refused to get off and one in his waistband and one on his neck. On the plus side, we now know that the children don't suffer from anaphylactic shock and they recovered fairly quickly with antihistamines.
It was very alarming though as you can imagine. Now, understandably, The Child has a terrible fear of wasps. We have been trying to overcome it over the past few weeks and he was OK in Jersey but now we are home he is not happy - apparently the wasps here are bigger and therefore will probably hurt more.Fingers crossed he never sees a hornet...
The result of this is that any wasp that approached causes an instant desire to go inside. This is where my Summer Of Fun - enjoying the warm weather and being outside and BBQ joy is in jeopardy...
I remembered this morning however about something I purchased last year but never got around to using. It was a Waspinator - a material bag which you basically hang up and it is supposed to mimic a waps's nest and therefore deter wasps from the area. I never got around to using it though. I have put it up under the brolly in the garden and a few hours in, there definitely seems to be less wasp action. I am keeping my fingers crossed...
**Update** So 24 hours in and it's looking promising. The tester was breakfast. Yesterday without a Waspinator, we had bacon and eggs and there was enough wasp activity to make eating outside not a good experience. This morning, with the Waspinator in situ, we had kippers on toast. There was some wasp investigation but they flew off again. I also placed an offering of some apple juice on a table a little bit away from us and the wasps seems to head straight for that. So I think it does help to deter the wasps and is effective when coupled with something else to lure them elsewhere. It did a very good job of instilling some confidence again into The Child to be able to sit outside stress-free, so that works for me!
The Waspinator is available on Amazon
So my summer of fun is under threat. On a recent trip we stayed with some friends for a few nights who have a lovely house and garden and pond. On night one, the children were near the pond feeding the resident duck when The Dog ambled over, saw The Duck and promptly barked at it. This had the unfortunate effect of alarming the wasps who had seemingly built a nest near the pond and made them come out, chasing after the children and attacking them. They all had at least 5 stings each. Even The Dog got stung in her tail - the wasps were particularly aggressive. My Child had one on his ear that refused to get off and one in his waistband and one on his neck. On the plus side, we now know that the children don't suffer from anaphylactic shock and they recovered fairly quickly with antihistamines.
It was very alarming though as you can imagine. Now, understandably, The Child has a terrible fear of wasps. We have been trying to overcome it over the past few weeks and he was OK in Jersey but now we are home he is not happy - apparently the wasps here are bigger and therefore will probably hurt more.Fingers crossed he never sees a hornet...
The result of this is that any wasp that approached causes an instant desire to go inside. This is where my Summer Of Fun - enjoying the warm weather and being outside and BBQ joy is in jeopardy...
I remembered this morning however about something I purchased last year but never got around to using. It was a Waspinator - a material bag which you basically hang up and it is supposed to mimic a waps's nest and therefore deter wasps from the area. I never got around to using it though. I have put it up under the brolly in the garden and a few hours in, there definitely seems to be less wasp action. I am keeping my fingers crossed...
**Update** So 24 hours in and it's looking promising. The tester was breakfast. Yesterday without a Waspinator, we had bacon and eggs and there was enough wasp activity to make eating outside not a good experience. This morning, with the Waspinator in situ, we had kippers on toast. There was some wasp investigation but they flew off again. I also placed an offering of some apple juice on a table a little bit away from us and the wasps seems to head straight for that. So I think it does help to deter the wasps and is effective when coupled with something else to lure them elsewhere. It did a very good job of instilling some confidence again into The Child to be able to sit outside stress-free, so that works for me!