An owner of two of my Vizslas saw the puppy photos and wrote, “They look like hamburger buns.” I’m thinking, she’s right!
Bill’s at a conference in California for five days. Count them…FIVE days. That leaves me with the horses and pups ALONE for FIVE days. Not to mention the Yellow Jacket Queens (at least 1.5 inches long and thick bodied) that are squeezing in through the window frame in the dining room (southern exposure). According to Dr. Bug the Yellow Jackets produce 300 to 400 queens this time of year and the queens journey out to find a place to winter over. Well, they’ve “found” the bay window in the dining room. After three days of squishing four or five of these mammoth things at a time and doing this four times each day I got a hold of Dr. Bug. Two of his men came and sprayed outside. I went into the house to get a cheque for them and took a look into the dining room. I called the men into the house. They were stunned. There were at least two dozen of these big things buzzing around, thankfully confined to ONE room.
In the evening the queens cluster on the wall, ceiling, window, light. They’re alive, but not moving and that’s when I go on my squishing rampage. I’ve done this for three nights. Each evening there are more to kill. Tonight’s total was over 30.
If I want to get into the kitchen during the day I have three options:
1. open the west doors to the dining room, walk through it and the dozens of buzzing things to the sliding kitchen door, open it and I’m in the “safe” east side of the room. Bill constructed a barrier of puppy gates creating an area on the west side of the kitchen for the puppies. The sink, stove, refrigerator are on the east side, so is the door to the garage.
2. go through the west door of the kitchen, walk carefully amongst six extremely alert and active puppies, climb over the barrier
3. go out the front door, walk around to the garage, enter the garage, enter the house and land safely in the east side of the kitchen
I’ve been opting for the outdoor approach. I’m so glad that it’s not raining!!!!!
As far as Queens are concerned I figure I’m approaching the 200 mark and have 100 or 200 left to kill (that is after they leave their temporary domicile inside the dining room wall and join us in the dining room). The good news this morning is: there was a frost on the ground and at 7:45 only one Queen was buzzing in the room. However, at 11:00 the sun was shinning and twelve of the suckers were celebrating life in my house. Dr. Bug did say that it’d be a few days before they all crawled out. This is day four post-spraying and still counting!
And to think that earlier this week I didn’t know that Yellow Jackets created 300 to 400 queens in October. Helps keep me young…learning new things!!!!
