Best way to rid of carpenter bees?

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[ARCHIVED THREAD] - Best way to rid of carpenter bees?

Posted: 4/30/2021 7:11:18 AM EDT

They're destroying my stuff.

Whacking them is satisfying but there are just too many!

Posted: 4/30/2021 7:34:28 AM EDT

[#1]

Those wood and plastic carpenter bee traps work wonders on my front porch with wood columns.

Posted: 4/30/2021 7:47:47 AM EDT

[#2]

I’ve been having fun with 22 shot shells in an 8 shot revolver. Damn it’s fun. But so far I’m having a 5 shit to 1 bee ratio. This will get expensive. Lol

Posted: 4/30/2021 7:48:57 AM EDT

[#3]

Cover everything in steel or aluminum.

Posted: 4/30/2021 8:12:34 AM EDT

[#4]

Wiffle ball bat is my weapon of choice but I've only dealt with 3-4 at a time.

Posted: 4/30/2021 8:14:11 AM EDT

[#5]

Quote History

Quoted:
Those wood and plastic carpenter bee traps work wonders on my front porch with wood columns.

View Quote

Those things don’t work for me. They’ll get one or two out of hundreds.

I put a bounty on them and the children do a pretty good job at keeping them under control. Most of them get shot with a BB gun.

Posted: 4/30/2021 9:55:12 AM EDT

[#6]

This thread is relevant to my interest, my house is a log cabin and this spring they are everywhere

Posted: 4/30/2021 10:11:45 AM EDT

[#7]

I saw a FB post about using a brown paper lunch bag. Fill it with plastic store bags and crumple it up to look like a wasp nest, then hang it where the bees are.
Apparently the wasps eat the bees, so they will leave the area.
I'm going to try this because they are destroying my porch railing.

Posted: 4/30/2021 10:14:31 AM EDT

[#8]

Buy a can of starting fluid at the auto parts store & squirt a shot into every bore hole you find. It kills them.
Don't worry about the bees you see hovering nearby, those are the males guarding the bore holes. It's the females that are doing the boring.

Posted: 4/30/2021 10:24:27 AM EDT

[#9]

Good ol' carpenter bee season...

68 confirmed kills this year. Badminton racket and airsoft full auto for those out of reach. There is no other way unless you want to get a flame thrower

Each year I kill around 80-100. I keep an excell spreadsheet for each season.

One year it was about 350 but that was back when I was getting started and was over run by them.

Rinse and repeat annually.

The traps work fair to poorly. I have 4 around the house and they might kill 10 at most during the season

Posted: 4/30/2021 10:52:18 AM EDT

[#10]

Quote History

Quoted:
Good ol' carpenter bee season...

68 confirmed kills this year. Badminton racket and airsoft full auto for those out of reach. There is no other way unless you want to get a flame thrower

Each year I kill around 80-100. I keep an excell spreadsheet for each season.

One year it was about 350 but that was back when I was getting started and was over run by them.

Rinse and repeat annually.

The traps work fair to poorly. I have 4 around the house and they might kill 10 at most during the season

View Quote

You're only killing the males by shooting the ones you see hovering around.

Posted: 5/1/2021 7:23:24 AM EDT

[#11]

Just sprayed Pine-Sol on the wood.

So far it is working.

Posted: 5/1/2021 7:27:19 AM EDT

[#12]

my son (5) gets a squirt gun to slow them down. I get a tennis racket, BB gun, or stick.

shooting them on the wing with a red ryder is hard but satisfying.

Posted: 5/1/2021 8:35:00 AM EDT

[#13]

Badminton racquet for fun.

Chemical warfare for the win.

Posted: 5/1/2021 8:41:34 AM EDT

[#14]

Bifenthrin.

I have to spread my soffits this time every year

Posted: 5/1/2021 8:56:27 AM EDT

[#15]

delta dust in their holes. kills them wholesale.

Posted: 5/1/2021 9:09:02 AM EDT

[#16]

NEW! UNCENSORED! 2016 BUG-A-SALT BBQ Commercial

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRgjLXrUebw

Posted: 5/4/2021 4:35:56 PM EDT

[#17]

Ordinarily I’d say 22 shot shells. But those are impossible to find now if you don’t already have them. I have a few boxes left.

They are tough to bring down however. Not many BBs. And if you wait for them to hover to draw a bead on them , they seem to know it and zoom off fast.

The most challenging winged game their is.
Dragonflies tough too. But those bugs must be armored. 22s don’t phase them much, when they’ve obviously been hit. Something like a 410 is needed for them. Also very challenging game.

Posted: 5/12/2021 5:36:14 PM EDT

[#18]

Get some kind of squeeze bottle like those cheap red and yellow ketchup/mustard bottles fill it like 1/4-1/2 of the way up with Sevin Dust from the gardening section at Lowe's or Home Depot or wherever and puff a shitload of it down into the holes you can see. It gets on them when they enter and they track it in deeper and will kill the rest of the colony.

You want some air space for the dust to really be able to puff so don't fill the bottle up completely.

Give it a few days then fill up the holes with great stuff expanding foam

Then you'll need to find something to spray on the wood to deter them from coming back.

Posted: 5/15/2021 7:29:44 AM EDT

[#19]

I use this on my cabin.

Posted: 5/15/2021 7:51:06 AM EDT

[#20]

straight shaft stihl weedeater, they explode!!!

Posted: 5/15/2021 1:00:11 PM EDT

[#21]

I use the bee traps, but its important to load it with a dead bee. When they die, the release a scent that other bees smell, and they think its an empty nest that they can take. They climb in, fall in the bottle, and get stuck.

Made them myself when I had an old wood house. Just a wooden box with a hole on the front for them to crawl into, then another at the bottom with a 20oz coke bottle stuck in it.

Posted: 5/16/2021 2:25:15 PM EDT

[#22]

Quote History

Quoted:
Those wood and plastic carpenter bee traps work wonders on my front porch with wood columns.

View Quote

I tried one of these. I wounded a bee with my Bug-A-Salt rifle (I shot it 4 times and it still wasn't dead) and loaded it into the bee trap. This was roughly 3 weeks ago. The trap hasn't caught a single bee. I consider the bee trap to be a failure.

Posted: 5/16/2021 8:25:09 PM EDT

[#23]

Quote History

Quoted:
I tried one of these. I wounded a bee with my Bug-A-Salt rifle (I shot it 4 times and it still wasn't dead) and loaded it into the bee trap. This was roughly 3 weeks ago. The trap hasn't caught a single bee. I consider the bee trap to be a failure.

View Quote

I have one here. It worked well the first year. Never caught another bee after that.

Posted: 5/18/2021 11:05:35 AM EDT

[#24]

Quote History

Quoted:
I use the bee traps, but its important to load it with a dead bee. When they die, the release a scent that other bees smell, and they think its an empty nest that they can take. They climb in, fall in the bottle, and get stuck.

Made them myself when I had an old wood house. Just a wooden box with a hole on the front for them to crawl into, then another at the bottom with a 20oz coke bottle stuck in it.

View Quote

I've heard that works, but I've had mixed results. I built my own, plus bought one. Each trap caught exactly 2 bees, after catching just about every wasp in the county.

Posted: 5/18/2021 11:16:10 AM EDT

[#25]

Quote History

Quoted:
This thread is relevant to my interest, my house is a log cabin and this spring they are everywhere

View Quote

Bair used to make a log stain that we used on our log house. I can’t remember the name Cetal oil is what we used on the cedar.

Posted: 5/18/2021 9:19:58 PM EDT

[#26]

We just sprayed the area with peppermint oil. Took a few weeks but they all disappeared.

Posted: 5/18/2021 9:28:33 PM EDT

[#27]

Quote History

Quoted:
I tried one of these. I wounded a bee with my Bug-A-Salt rifle (I shot it 4 times and it still wasn't dead) and loaded it into the bee trap. This was roughly 3 weeks ago. The trap hasn't caught a single bee. I consider the bee trap to be a failure.

View Quote View All Quotes

View All Quotes

Quote History

Quoted:

Quoted:
Those wood and plastic carpenter bee traps work wonders on my front porch with wood columns.

I tried one of these. I wounded a bee with my Bug-A-Salt rifle (I shot it 4 times and it still wasn't dead) and loaded it into the bee trap. This was roughly 3 weeks ago. The trap hasn't caught a single bee. I consider the bee trap to be a failure.

OK, so roughly 48 hours after I posted, I checked my trap again and found this. I take back everything bad I said about them.

Posted: 5/24/2021 11:59:47 AM EDT

[#28]

In the past I've used Cyzmic or Demand CS. This year I tried LambdaStar UltraCap and had 15 dead bees the next day. I'm also trying the paper bag nest trick. I have a hole in my facia from a damn pileated woodpecker. I would ask what round for woodpecker but that would be illegal and get me in trouble if caught.

Posted: 5/24/2021 1:27:27 PM EDT

[#29]

Quote History

Quoted:
Good ol' carpenter bee season...

68 confirmed kills this year. Badminton racket and airsoft full auto for those out of reach. There is no other way unless you want to get a flame thrower

Each year I kill around 80-100. I keep an excell spreadsheet for each season.

One year it was about 350 but that was back when I was getting started and was over run by them.

Rinse and repeat annually.

The traps work fair to poorly. I have 4 around the house and they might kill 10 at most during the season

View Quote

That is some meticulous record keeping.

Posted: 5/25/2021 2:28:10 PM EDT

[#30]

Here is what I've tried so far:

-Carpenter bee killer sprayed in the holes: works pretty well
-Bug a salt: Fun but most of them don't even notice it. Great for flies though.
-Propane weed burner: They are too fast for this, also risk of burning everything down

Posted: 5/25/2021 3:34:01 PM EDT

[#31]

Another cheap and easy to get product is brake cleaner. A shot of that in their holes kills them quick.

Posted: 5/25/2021 3:56:35 PM EDT

[#32]

I've had good luck with the hanging traps. Also rubbing alcohol in a spray bottle fucks them up bad.

Posted: 5/25/2021 4:43:49 PM EDT

[#33]

Quote History

Quoted:
Bifenthrin.

I have to spread my soffits this time every year

View Quote

This! Shit is a miracle worker! Get a quart and you are an Orkin Man for 10 years.

I mix 2 ounces per gallon and spray all the soffits and exposed wood.

Takes care of carpenter bees, wasps, and spiders around the whole house.

Same active ingredient as Ortho Home Defense Max just much cheaper and a higher concentration.

Posted: 5/25/2021 5:42:10 PM EDT

[#34]

This thread is relevant to my interests.

Carpenter bees are bad enough but we also have a shit ton of woodpeckers.

1) Bee goes in the hole
2) Woodpecker decides to chase the bee
3) Gigantic crater left after woodpecker opens the 1/2" bee hole to around 2 1/2" in diameter

Posted: 6/7/2021 10:31:28 PM EDT

[#35]

Quote History

Quoted:

This! Shit is a miracle worker! Get a quart and you are an Orkin Man for 10 years.

I mix 2 ounces per gallon and spray all the soffits and exposed wood.

Takes care of carpenter bees, wasps, and spiders around the whole house.

Same active ingredient as Ortho Home Defense Max just much cheaper and a higher concentration.

View Quote

This is the stuff. (Bifenthrin) But everybody please follow the label. MOAR is NOT BETTER.

REad the label.

It's 15 minutes of your life. Do what it says. Wear the personal protective equipment it says (long sleeves, long pants, shoes plus socks. some kind of plastic glove you can throw away, eye protection if you are spraying overhead and maybe a mask) For your kids and..you know...honeybees and shit.

Posted: 6/12/2021 2:13:45 PM EDT

[#36]

block of wood on a bottle with some holes drilled in wood.
burrow into wood, get in bottle, can't get out

Posted: 6/12/2021 2:20:29 PM EDT

[#37]

Quote History

Quoted:
I saw a FB post about using a brown paper lunch bag. Fill it with plastic store bags and crumple it up to look like a wasp nest, then hang it where the bees are.
Apparently the wasps eat the bees, so they will leave the area.
I'm going to try this because they are destroying my porch railing.

View Quote

….

That explains why one of my neighbors have a weird grocery store bag hanging over the porch.

Posted: 6/12/2021 4:46:54 PM EDT

[#38]

Electric Badminton racquet from Harbor Freight.
Anything more fun has to be illegal.

Posted: 6/12/2021 6:41:58 PM EDT

[#39]

They're the only pollinators I see regularly, so I don't bother them. I actually think they're pretty cool. I have heard of people hanging/placing scrap pieces of 4x4s around their property to keep them from burrowing in unwanted places.