By Little_hen
United Kingdom 
Hi. Can anyone offer any advice please? Not a plant question, but to do with the garden nontheless.
Some wasps have decided to make a home of one of our birdhouses. We want to move this, but without harming the wasps. The birdhouse isn't permanently connected to anything, but hanging from a tree. My husband went out last night after dark looking like a burglar to move the birdhouse to some woods near our garden, but the wasps clearly got cross and the operation was aborted! The plan had been to block of the hole into the birdhouse which is very tiny now anyway as the wasps have filled it up, put the house into a box and move it. Then put the box down in nearby woods and then make a quick retreat.
Does anyone know if we can do this safely? We really don't want to harm the wasps but we do need to move it as it is on a path which we can't avoid and we have hairless dogs and chickens which we definitely don't want to be stung of couse. Would the wasps be OK if we moved them anyway? Perhaps someone has another suggestion.
Thank you.
Susie
8 Jul, 2015
Answers
Sadly I don't know of any way you can move safely - you can buy a powder that you puff onto the nest, the wasps take the powder into the byke and it kills them all. Problem is we need wasps to pollenate plants.
8 Jul, 2015
I hate wasps. If a wasp gets in t my house, it gets a death sentence. If a honeybee or Bumblebee gets in my house, I use a glass and piece of card. I love bees. Wasps don't care who they sting.
I avoid wasps like the plague but will happily stand by bees.
My answer is to use an insecticide.
You can also buy fake wasps nests, which you put up to deter wasps from nesting nearby as it looks like a rival nest.
8 Jul, 2015
Contact your council for advice - some will come out and remove wasp nests for free.
8 Jul, 2015
Sadly you would not be able to move the whole nest. The wasps would almost certainly abandon it in any case.
We deal with any nests near the house (my wife is allergic to their stings and I do not want to have to rush her to A&E again).
I use a foam Nest Destroying spray. Follow the info on the can and there should be no problem. Our local council charges the earth the deal with them.
8 Jul, 2015
I agree, that foam stuff works very well, just wait until the wasps are in for the night. I don't think you can risk either leaving it or moving it, you will get stung!
8 Jul, 2015
Thank you for your advice. Not too sure what we are going to do now. Wish they hadn't taken over the birdhouse!
8 Jul, 2015
It is a problem, we had that happen to us too.
8 Jul, 2015
Erm, my response probably won't be much use to you. Having been stung many times, I hate wasps, and if there was a nest anywhere near or actually in my house, I'd be calling pest control. They may be harmless right now, but by August, there will be considerably more of them and from late August onwards, they'll sting anything they touch. Which was when I found out they were in the roof space over the bathroom last time - I got stung twice....
Bees, on the other hand, are an altogether different matter - troubles with those means I call a beekeeper instead.
8 Jul, 2015