The creepy crawly thread.....

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It's amazing she's still alive. A friend of mine has a nest of Asian Hornets in his back yard. They have wiped out two hive of his neighbor honey bees and he can't find anyone to get rid of them.
 
Thought you had mistyped and meant the african honeybees. these guys have been moving in on europe and the UK, did not know they had made it to the US. they look like small birds. note the nest.
 

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ABW, those are asian hornets, if you are thinking something smaller there is a N American wasp called a cicadia killer about an inch and a half to two inches long
 

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From what my friend has found on the internet and in books the size and coloration say what he has is the Asian and from what he has shown me I would tend to agree. Now I am not an expert and will never claim to be. I'm just going by what I have been shown. The insect in you photos has a solid black marking on it. The ones that I have come into contact with that marking is a yellowish hued black and they are as you said, about a inch and a half in length. They are EXTREMELY AGGRESIVE! I really could not tell you what they are. I just know I have not ever seen an insect this aggresive. They chase anything away from the nest and I do mean anything.
 
i'm not an insect guy either, the asian hornet is the first one, almost 4in long and agressive around the nest. they have been reported in france and warnings are out for the UK. as far as i have been able to determine none are in the US. they do prey on honeybees and can quickly destroy a hive. eating the honey and carrying off the pupa to feed their own young
the cicadia killer is also at times refered to as an asian hornet though it is a soltary ground-dwelling wasp (no nest). if you ever get an ID let me know
 
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Mike, I think we may have come to a conclusion. I believe that they are European Hornets. I may be wrong. If I can get some photos of them I will post them this weekend. Thanks for the help.
 
Aaron Brooks Wolters said:
Mike, I think we may have come to a conclusion. I believe that they are European Hornets. I may be wrong. If I can get some photos of them I will post them this weekend. Thanks for the help.
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Why is it that "Quest for the Holy Grail" comes to mind right now?

I've seen a cicada-killer buzzing around my back yard a couple of times this summer. Hopefully he's the reason a wasp nest never got past two or three chambers constructed, before being mysteriously abandoned. And, thankfully, he's never gotten interested/pissed at me. I know all insects on God's green earth have their purpose, but dang....hornets and wasps just bug me.
 
I've seen the Cicada killers around here, too. A budy of mine says they can't hurt you, but I never stuck around long enough to find out. Those things are as big as my thumb!
 
diddy, cicada killer wasps are relatively non-aggressive to humans but can and will sting if provoked. as solitary ground-dellers they have no nest to defend so just don't step on one
 
ABW, here are your european hornets. they are non-aggressive and will actually back away and escape if approached. they will defend the nest, quite aggressively. but if you approach slowly and breath away from the nest you can get within 20in. because of their size there are many urban legends about them. i.e. One sting will kill a human and seven kill a horse. they are attraced to food and lights and unlike most wasp/hornets will fly at night often banging into lights or windows. I have found nothing about them attacking bee hives but will prey on individual worker bees. They are an endangered species and protected in most countries. In Germany it is a 50,000 euro fine to destroy a nest
 

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