Potential Wasp nests in ground

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I have these nests in the ground. They are built within our brick walkway where there is dirt in between the bricks. The holes are maybe a quarter of an inch or a little bigger and the resulting mounts are pretty large.

I wouldn't have suspected wasps but I saw this guy in our front yard walking around and when I approached him - he explained we have a wasp issue in the neighborhood so representing some pest control company was offering a special. He showed me the pictures of the wasps and explained they were very aggressive.

I didn't take him up on the offer because I didn't like the fact he just was walking around my yard - and I didn't believe the wasps were aggressive and I thought he was just trying to scare me.

I had stepped on the mounds before just to see what would happen and I didn't see any wasps nor was I threatened or anything and I'd been walking around that area of my yard for days without a sting. Any way I had some ant and other bug stuff so I simply filled the wholes with liquid stuff. I was going away for several days so I wasn't in a position to do anything else.

Fast forward those few days - I come home to find even more mounds and holes. I looked up some stuff and it seems the best suggestion was for me to go get some ammonia and during the night to fill the holes with it over several nights.

Anyone know - I guess first off - are these wasps? And is this a good method?

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[+3] - roger - 08/22/2017All in all, I'm thinking that pest control guy's priority is selling a service. That, or he was just casing the neighborhood to see what might be worth breaking into. I'm no tree hugger, but I...

@Linkat,

If they are the little purple wasps we have here (NM), they're the least aggressive critters in the whole yard.

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@roger,

I haven't even noticed them - but I have never seen purple ones. Only like yellowish ones.

There was something I was reading about cicada killer wasps - it sounded like the holes descriptions we have. But like I said I been around them and stomped on the mounds and filled in the holes with ant and mosquito killer liquid and nothing came at me. And it was during the middle of the day. So they can't be all that aggressive.

anything I read about these critters via pest control product warn you that they are bad - but other places don't say anything bad about them more that they will only sting with provoked. I've never had a bad reaction (of course it hurts) but no allergies.

But there are more holes - it also says that each hole is probably just one wasp.

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So I found one website that describes 3 wasps that burrow in the ground and one bee. The only one being aggressive is the yellow jacket - which I've seen around since I was a kid. We had a yellow jacket paper hive in our tree last year.

On the website it says you would know a yellow jacket not by the burrowing holes, but You can tell yellow jackets apart from other types of ground-nesting wasps by their numbers and reaction to you. Yellow jacket nests contain dozens to thousands of individual wasps, all eager to sting you in nest defense.

So obviously they are not yellow jackets - and I do remember the guy saying something about Vespula which yellow jackets are part of this family - so I think he was trying to scare me to buy their service. Also he didn't seem particularly scared to be hanging around these holes.

Just that the number of holes have been increasing and I worry about potential damage (not to mention it doesn't look all that nice).

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@Linkat,

All in all, I'm thinking that pest control guy's priority is selling a service. That, or he was just casing the neighborhood to see what might be worth breaking into. I'm no tree hugger, but I don't kill stuff just for whatever satisfaction I might derive.

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@Linkat,

Back when I lived in Los Angeles in our old bungalow house, I found wasps in the garage. The garage was rickety; I remodeled it at one point. If I remember, the wasps were before the remodeling. Anyway, I can be a bug/spider/wasp scaredy cat; not all, of course. (I happen to like crickets.) I called the city. By now I forget what that department was called. They sent a guy out and he got rid of the wasps. No charge. Whew!

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@roger,

agreed -- a sale attempt using scare tactics...

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@ossobucotemp,

I'll admit I don't remember if the guy saved the wasp nest in some way - probably not. I don't remember if I knew if they were yellow jackets. I think I remember them as fairly big, but I don't know about wasp sizes. I was busy being scared and then relieved.

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I think I will just let them be(e). I haven't even seen a wasp near the holes. From what I am reading they are solitary which would make sense as they are not swarming around. The only issue I see is the holes are not aesthetic to the walkway - we don't use the front very often so I see no issue.

I also read that these types of warps/bees may help via pollination and/or killing other less desirable bugs.

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@ossobucotemp,

If it was a hive with lots of wasps then they are more likely to be aggressive - they are trying to save the hive - whereas these ground wasps/bees (as long as it isn't a hive underground) tend to be passive - as one thing I read they say since they are solitary they are way too busy to be concerned about you and some of these the male cannot sting and the female will only to defend itself like if you step on it.

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@Linkat,

Can you permanently seal the areas between the bricks?

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@tsarstepan,

Eventually we would want to replace or upgrade the walkway. It seems when the bricks were placed - they just dug them in without any sealant or plastic to prevent stuff from growing there - I am constantly putting down stuff to prevent weeds.

But we have so many projects that need to be done who knows when we would get to it. Probably by the time we were to do so - the wasps would be gone.

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@Linkat,

wait until winter before you dig the queen out Razz

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This season I have had an active nest of yellow jackets in the ground near one of my garden plots. I'm usually content to "live and let live" with wasps and hornets and I've been carefully working around the entrance hole so as not to get them riled up. At times the nest is pretty active and the yellow jackets are just boiling out of the ground — it's pretty cool to see. Anyway, I went out this morning to do some watering and when I stepped around the plot and looked for the nest...it had been totally excavated! Instead of an inch diameter hole there's now something that looks like a mortar round landed there, a big gaping hole around eight inches wide and bits of the paper nest scattered around. Raccoons — I've seen them do this before, methodically ripping into a nest while being stung by angry yellow jackets. Bears will also do this; once I saw an entire tree stump that had been ripped out of the ground by a bear after a yellow jacket nest. Those yellow jacket larvae must be tasty.

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