What gets rid of Carpenter bees?

[Duane Broussard]

Every summer.... here they come! They hang out around my back steps (made from thick fur wood). They've bored holes all over the bottom side of the steps. I once swatted 252 of them in one day with a badmitten racket. That was a drop in the bucket on thier count. Someone said they live in the dirt under your home, yet I only see them in their holes bored in the steps and a few other locations (wood) around the property. How do you kill these things and keep them from returning the next year??
Thanks in advance,
Duane

 

[Haywire Haywood]

Good question. I've got a few myself boring their way into my barn but not as many as you do. I just shoot the holes full of whatever I have in the way of an aerosol. WD-40 is my favorite. I can hear them buzzing away and Pssst... no more buzzing. They don't even make it out of the hole.

Ian

 

[jdboy9]

Brake cleaner works for me pretty fast use it on other nasty bugs too

 

[deeker]

We cut a bit of quakie aspen for picture frames.......they request the boards from those trees that have been eaten by carpenter ants. Huge ants. I know how to spray for them once they leave the wood. But, not so easy to spray wood heading to the customer. I am interested in this thread. Short of kiln drying.....

Kevin Davis
Ruff Cutts

 

[slabmaster]

Yea, i got them too.They are like a little milling machine,dropping sawdust all over my truck hood in the barn.I just spray up in the hole with bee spray.Then i have bee spray dripping on the hood. Didn't have them a few years ago.Seems like alot of new bugs in the country since world trade started.Who nows what we have to look forward to now

 

[Mike Van]

A friend of ours had them bad on his white pine siding, they finally had to call Terminex or someone like that - While they still had some siding left. It worked, whatever they sprayed, no more bees.

 

[Mad Professor]

Boric acid works on all insects, it's not too toxic to mammals unless you ingest it.

 

[deeker]

I doubt that the bees and ants are related, but I need to kill both of them. And the bores that are in my Ponderosa pine logs.

Kevin Davis
Ruff Cutts

 

[aggiewoodbutchr]

Fire!!!

 

[Duane Broussard]

Yes.... I keep hearing that Boric acid is the key against most insects.

Aggiewoodbutchr.... Understandably, fire will get rid of ANYTHING. However, I can't set my steps on fire.

They calm down at late evening... I suppose that would be the time to shoot the bores with acid... or brake cleaner...etc...

 

[czeigler]

Yes.... I keep hearing that Boric acid is the key against most insects.

Aggiewoodbutchr.... Understandably, fire will get rid of ANYTHING. However, I can't set my steps on fire.

They calm down at late evening... I suppose that would be the time to shoot the bores with acid... or brake cleaner...etc...

We used to fill the holes with silicone at night! :hmm3grin2orange:

 

[Metals406]

 

[Metals406]

In all seriousness, I've heard if you take a 4x4 post and drill a bunch of 3/16" holes in it, and plant it in the yard... The bees will use that to nest. Something like 5' out of the ground I think.

Farmers use them to pollinate in Central Washington.

 

[dumbhunter]

lol at metals, got me a civie model of the m-4, mine just dont have the bee selector position on it, just deer.

i would love to know the aswer to this question also as i hae em bad around here also. last year i would wait till around dark and whatch them go in the holes, then use touch-n-foam. this way i know i got them while thaey are home. and the next dayor so i would see more buzzing around wondering what happened to the hole. thats when i hit them with cheap hairspray. it glues the wings so they cant fly 'squish' but it seems they keep coming by the droves. we had them fighting the humming birds over the flowers on our tulip tree. they then would hit the humming bird feeders.

for ants i use a product called 'amdro'. has worked well for me. just find the colony and sprinkle a little , next day- colony dead!

 

[Duane Broussard]

Well.... these bores are about 1/4". I suppose I'm going to have to take my steps loose from the house, turn them upside down, and dose the holes with a mixture of boric acid, brake cleaner, hair spray, and insect spray. Oh.... and then light it on fire.
These steps are about 10 feet long and each step is 3 inches thick. 4 boards, stepped to 36" high. Big set of steps... and apparently this is where they decided to make thier home.

 

[neverrude]

I give the grand kids badminton rackets and pay them .25 for each one they get and
remind them to be careful and not wack each other. They have a ball, I must have paid out over $10. last summer

 

[pdqdl]

I got just what you want...

The carpenter bees are actually pretty easy to eliminate. They don't make hives, as do many bees, they LIVE and breed in the holes you are seeing. They prefer unpainted wood with low moisture content, and they usually bore into the wood from the bottom (dry) side to prevent getting wet when it rains.

Easy to treat:

1. Paint the wood, especially the bottom sides of the joists. Easy on garage rafters, totally sucks on ground level front porches.

2. Get any common, over-the-counter insecticide, and spray it into every hole you find. EVEN last year's holes. Solvents like brake cleaner work well, but they evaporate and go away. Put something into the hole that will be there next year, too. They re-use old holes, unless you make it a bad place to live. One gallon "pump upo" yard sprayers work real well for this.

3. Plug any holes you find with whatever is easiest. Normal houshold caulk works well. It is most satisfying if you do it after dark, when they are inside the holes.

4. If the problem persists, "nuke" the wood surfaces with a harsher insecticide from somebody with a pesticide applicators license or spray the wood with something really vile like creosote or used motor oil [THINK FIRE HAZARD AND HAZARDOUS WASTE issues].

Be aware that some of the little buggers might just be buzzing through, looking for a good home. They might be overcrowded at your neighbors house.

 

[zopi]

heh...fire does work..old stable out back is burning merrily right now..gotta make room for the saw shed. iffit'd kwit raining :censored: I'd be out there
sawing timbers for it.

apparently they don't like wd-40 much either...little shot through the hole and they come crawling out and DIE!

 

[pdqdl]

job satisfaction

That wd-40 thing is the most fun at dusk, when they are just settling in for the night. No good for keeping them out next year, though.

Did you know that carpenter bees (at least the ones around here) don't have stingers ?

GREAT story: I had a worker's comp insurance man at my shop doing a "walk-through" to evaluate our various occupational hazards. I presume he was looking for reasons to increase my rates. A big yellow & black bee buzzed him real close, but I told him not to worry, it was just the carpenter bees. "They fly in real slow that way, trying to find their hole. Don't worry, they don't even have stingers."

Just one minute later he was jumping and whooping and swearing from a bee sting. It turns out that some bumble bees had set up an underground nest in that area, and they just don't seem to like insurance men.

I was much closer to the nest, and they didn't bother me ! [I hate insurance companies, and don't care much for their people, either!]

 

[Stihl 041S]

Bees no more

Soak cotton balls in SVEN, stuff it in the hole. It will kill it or they won"t come back to that hole.

They also stay to one board it seems. If you find one board with a lot of holes, replace it.

Thanks to the Penn State Extention folks.
Rob