Bee, Wasp, & Hornet Removal in Charlotte, NC
These creatures play important roles in our ecosystem, from pollinating plants to keeping pest populations under control. Some are social creatures while others prefer more solo time, and different species have differing levels of aggressiveness when disturbed. Although they aren’t spreaders of disease, they will sting when feeling threatened, and these can be very painful. If someone in your family is allergic to these stings, this can create a dangerous situation.
If you need wasp, hornet, or bee removal services in the Greater Charlotte, North Carolina area, just contact us online or call 704-499-9922.
Types of Wasps/Hornets in North Carolina
Wasps, including hornets, can be quite aggressive if they feel threatened. This can include if you get too close to their nests, when you surprise them, or when you try to get them away from food and drink. Because they can build their nests nearer to your home than you might like, removing wasps or hornets from your house can present problems for you, your family, and your guests.
Wasps
Wasps found in North Carolina include the Northern paper wasp and the European paper wasp. The Northern variety is native to the United States, with yellow legs and reddish-brown markings on their bellies.
Northern paper wasps like to use wood to build their nests, from firewood to wood used in landscaping, and wood found in fences, sheds, barns, and homes. Because the substance they use to build their nests—wood—is found in houses and in structures and piles near homes, the Northern paper wasp nest is often built near homes.
This is a very social type of wasp, able to recognize that a wasp isn’t from their own species. They can also be a fertile bunch because, although a nest has a queen that mates and gives birth, this species will have periods of time with numerous fertile females within a single group.
If these wasps become agitated, they can sting a person multiple times. Unlike bees, they can remove their stinger from a person’s skin and re-use it to sting again. The queen can be especially aggressive and so can the older worker wasps in that colony who are protecting her.
The European paper wasp is not native to our country, but they have made their way to both the United States and Canada. They are black and yellow, smaller than the Northern variety, and can be mistaken for bees. These wasps are able to sting, although they are less aggressive than their Northern cousins, usually stinging when their nests are disturbed. They don’t go after food and drink outdoors, either, making them less of a nuisance.
Then there are the mud daubers, a non-social group of wasps that tend to build mud nests near humans. This species is not aggressive and, in fact, only the females have the ability to sting. They paralyze spiders and feed them to their young. During summer months, another solo type of wasp makes its appearance in our state: cicada killers. They paralyze the cicada to feed their offspring.
Hornets
Next up are hornets. Although they’re often referred to as a separate type of insects, they are actually a type of wasps. They look quite a bit like yellow jackets (more about them soon), but a bit fatter than other wasp species. Hornets will aggressively defend their nests with their stingers and their stings hurt more than those of other wasps because of the chemical composition in their venom.
A Note About the Yellow Jacket
Yellow jackets are often lumped together with bees in common lingo. They typically have a yellow and black pattern that resembles a bee, although they can sometimes have red or white markings. Scientifically, though, they are wasps. Yellow jackets live all around the world, with 16 species of them living in the United States. Like some other types of wasps, they like to hover over the tops of open soda cans, land on fruit to feast on it, and so forth.
Although they aren’t super aggressive, they will fiercely protect their nest. When they feel their territory is being threatened, they will sting, often multiple times, and these can be quite painful.
As you can see, there are numerous kinds of wasps, each with their own behaviors. If you need wasp nest removal services/hornet nest removal services, it typically doesn’t make sense to do it yourself because of the defensive behaviors wasps and hornets would likely display. Instead, contact trained professionals.
Types of Bees in North Carolina
The honey bee is the official state insect, being given this honor in 1973 by the North Carolina General Assembly. This type of bee is one of the most significant pollinators, playing a highly beneficial role in agriculture and our overall food supplies. After a honey bee stings someone, it will die.
As beneficial as honey bees are, you still won’t want them right by your house so, if there is a hive nearby, contact Noosa Pest Management for bee hive removal services.
Bumble bees also play an agricultural role, but they can be very aggressive if they feel threatened. They will chase people away for a significant distance and can sting multiple times. These stings are especially painful.
Another kind of bee in North Carolina is the carpenter bee. They resemble bumble bees in appearance but don’t sting very often. Having said that, they can cause significant structural damage to homes, nesting in the wood.
Finally, you may have seen stories of the Africanized honey bees in the news. This species can be exceptionally aggressive, dangerous to people who can’t quickly get away from them: young children, older adults, and people with disabilities. You may have heard that they arrived in North Carolina decades ago.
The reality is that swarms of them were on ships that arrived in two North Carolina ports—Morehead City (1989) and Wilmington (1991)—but they were destroyed before spreading. Trap nests are now in place at ports to attract, catch, and destroy any new swarms.
It can be challenging to know what species is nesting on your property. For safe and effective bee removal and bee exterminator services, no matter what species, contact the pest control experts at Noosa!
Keeping Bees, Wasps, and Hornets Away
Some species are attracted to sugary substances, from soda pop to cake. If you’re eating outdoors, make sure you clean up well afterwards, wiping up any spills. If you feed pets outdoors, don’t leave extras outside for these stinging pests to feast upon. Also keep trash cans tightly lidded.
There are also common household items that can repel them or proactively keep them away. They include dryer sheets (they don’t like the smell) that you can hang strategically on your property, perhaps around a deck or picnic table. Another odor they hate: mothballs. These can be placed in cheese cloth and hung up. You can spread pungent cloves, as well.
Also inspect around your home. Move piles of wood away from the structure and take care of decaying leaves. Each of these may attract bees. If you’ve got a flower garden, it makes sense to avoid planting it too close to your home because that’s a bee’s natural food source. If you’ve got empty buckets or flower pots outdoors, move them indoors.
Check to see if gaps exist in any siding because this could attract wasps. If you see any holes, seal them up because it doesn’t take a large one for bees, wasps, and hornets to get in. Weatherstrip cracks and crevices, as well, including around your windows and exterior doors.
More About Bee Removal Services
Noosa Pest Management has been serving our communities in North Carolina and South Carolina since 2006. If you have concerns about honey bees near your home and want bee hive removal service so that these beneficial creatures can contribute to agriculture in places further away from your family, we’re here to help. Or if you need a bee exterminator for other species, our professional technicians are available to provide you with the services you need.
We offer complimentary, no-obligation estimates for any of the pest control services we offer, including bee removal. Just contact us online or call 704-499-9922. Our friendly, courteous team will answer your questions and provide you with an estimate for our affordable services
More About Wasp Nest Removal Services
We also offer wasp nest removal services to keep you and your family safe. Any time you have colonies near your home, it’s wise to contact the professionals. We offer the same level of professionalism with our wasp exterminator services as we do with bees.
Choosing Noosa Pest Management
We provide residential and commercial pest control services in the Greater Charlotte community, with our locally owned and operated family business committed to using low impact solutions to minimize their impact on the environment. Plus, we actively participate in our community, volunteering for local charities and programs. Here’s more about our hardworking and dedicated team.
Contact us online or call 704-499-9922 for our bee, hornet, and wasp extermination services!
Bee, Wasp, and Hornet Removal FAQs
On the main page, we noted how DIY wasp nest removal typically isn’t a good idea because of the “defensive behaviors wasps and hornets would likely display.” Here’s more on the subject.
There are a few different wasp species in North Carolina (more than 4,000 types in the United States!), each with varying degrees of aggressiveness. Unless you’re certain what species you have in the nest by your home, you don’t really know how much combativeness to expect.
If the more confrontational species feel you’re threatening their nest (and, with hive removal, you would be doing that), they will likely sting. They may even gather back-up wasps to help in their attempt to protect their home. Wasp stings can be quite painful and, for those who are severely allergic, their stings can even be fatal; the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) notes an average of 62 deaths annually for hornet, wasp, and bee stings combined.
Here’s another way to consider the DIY wasp nest removal. It isn’t really the nest that’s the concern. It’s the wasps that live there. Once a wasp exterminator uses effective methods to eliminate any threat to you, your family, and your pets, the nest itself is unlikely to be used again. Queen wasps build new nests annually and it would be rare for another colony to inhabit a previously built one.
Finally, DIY wasp control products are typically not effective enough and could even be unsafe to apply. That’s why we recommend professional wasp removal services. In need of them? Please call us at 704-741-7049.
When we hear this question, it’s often because someone has seen a new story about the “murder hornets,” a nickname given to the Asian giant hornets that first arrived in the United States late in 2019. These are pretty scary looking creatures with spiked, sharp, fin-like jaws. Their stings have been described as “excruciating” and, in Japan, there are approximately 50 fatal stings per year. One of the big concerns is how these hornets can quickly wipe out honeybee hives.
So, what’s the risk in North Carolina? First, as of now, none of these murder hornets have been spotted in our state. In fact, they’ve been confined, so far, to parts of Canada and the far west in the United States. That’s the good news. If, though, your question is about a hornet’s nest on your property, inhabited by a species living in North Carolina, they can still be pretty aggressive with painful stings. Because of the histamine in their venom, the stings can trigger severe allergic reactions in certain people (and no one really knows how their bodies will react until they are actually stung). So, hornet nest removal is recommended.
Plus, one single hornet may sting multiple times. Under certain circumstances, a group of hornets swarm and this can lead to tens, or even hundreds, of stings. For hornet nest removals, please call us at 704-741-7049.
When it comes to bees, more so than any other stinging insect, the right kind of removal depends upon the kind of bees in the hive. With honey bees, for example, the value they provide to agriculture and our food supply can be hard to measure.
That said, here’s what the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has to say: “bee pollination accounts for about $15 billion in added crop value. Honey bees are like flying dollar bills buzzing over U.S. crops. . . . About one-third of the food eaten by Americans comes from crops pollinated by honey bees, including apples, melons, cranberries, pumpkins, squash, broccoli, and almonds, to name just a few. Without the industrious honey bee, American dinner plates would look quite bare.”
Call us at 704-741-7049 for your honey bee removal. As part of our bee hive removal for this species, we’ll relocate them so that they can contribute to agriculture—but in places that are well away from your Charlotte, North Carolina home.
Not all bees are this beneficial, though, and they have varying degrees of aggressiveness. If you or a family member gets stung, it will likely hurt—and, if anyone is allergic to them or gets stung multiple times, a more serious reaction can occur. At its most serious, a life-threatening condition called anaphylaxis can develop.
If you need a bee exterminator, please call us at 704-741-7049!