I love my grandparents...I really do but I HATE going to their house. They have a nice one story four bedroom suburban house with two good sized yards full of mature trees (some which produce fruit.) The inside is completely remodeled to be energy efficient and their grass is absolutely beautiful. Their front yard has a new stone retainer with beautiful roses in it. Yes...it is beautiful indeed.
They complain about this place constantly but that is besides the point. Their yard STINKS! Believe it or not, the terrible stench isnt from yard fertilizer either. It is from multiple bug traps. The one that smells the most is a wasp trap that hangs on some branches.
I stumbled upon a page (not using StumbleUpon for once) and found this interesting page that told me how pests were the best pest control. Oh how I wish I bookmarked that page. I have always been a firm believer in not using chemicals because of their unwanted consequences but man...now knowing that they can cause other pests to flourish? Why didnt I think about that?
Example...fleas suck especially if we have pets. How many of us thought about using flea predators to control them? Ants, ground beetles, and spiders are the top enemy for fleas. Of course...we often spray for spiders and ants. And a lot of things we dont mind having around eat spiders and ants (birds, mantis...all those cool things.)
As far as my grandparents go...what controls wasps? First I must say that we do have native hummingbirds but their numbers are few. I have a good feeling that they arent responsible for most of the food produced in their garden. I also must say that these traps are set because both grandparents have an allergy to wasp/bee stings. A few other truths...they dont draw birds to their yard because they eat their plums and spray for those wonderful things called spiders.
Birds and Spiders are huge wasp predators.
I imagine it doesnt help that the city sprays for mosquitoes every year and it is believed that this spray has limited the population of insect eating birds.
Many people (not earth friendly people) will try to eliminate them all. Remember...some bugs will flourish (like roaches) if this method takes place.
This doesnt mean I like these guys in my house though. No...my kitchen window and front door always contain some sort of mint. Ants hate mint for whatever reason (oh but I LOVE that smell.) Dont like mint? There are other ways to repel ants. As for spiders, I have a thing for citrus based cleaners which spiders hate. For the record, most insects hate citrus. Citronella is hated by...almost everything I hate (mosquitoes, spiders, flies, fleas....)
So just think about that before you go for chemicals. Are you really getting rid of the problem or are you just causing more?
