... If it isn't is there e anything you can do to get rid of them? Don't like having so many around with the kids playing outside.
Unfortunately, in my own experience there's very little you can do to get rid of them short of an all out thermonuclear barrage, which might upset the neighbours (ie France
) and also leave the neighbourhood slightly dishevelled in appearance.
You can try things like wasp traps made from jamjars filled with diluted jam or sugar, they tend to attract them and then they drown in them
en masse. The trouble is that they usually attract even more wasps to your garden so I'm unconvinced if they are actually that effective, though they can give you a psychological feeling that you are actually winning.
Citronella candles can be a short term deterrent, especially if you're having a barbeque, but I've had mixed results with them myself actually keeping wasps at bay, they are pretty hardened bastards. You can also try spraying a vinegar solution over outside wooden furniture, that too seems to have a slight deterrent effect but sadly not for very long, a couple of hours at most, and instead seems to simply attract hordes of fruit flies or similar vomit feeders as almost every stage of organic chemical decomposition and smell seems to have a particular fly species that specialises in thriving off it.
The best advice I'd give is to try and encourage your kids to be brave and ignore them and not make too much of a fuss flapping at them as that's not good and can make the wasps seriously grumpy. It's not easy and takes a bit of practice and above all confidence, but I've found that if you can keep pretty still, wasps simply have a good close up look at you, realise they can't eat you and then fly off somewhere else.
Wasps are not intelligent, they're quite simple critters really, just looking for an easy meal and they only become aggressive and sting when they feel threatened and think they have no other option.
