When we moved in, our one acre backyard came fully equipped with pesky, aggressive yellow jackets. These wasps are a serious nuisance because they are territorial, and they search for food people eat or discarded food. We assigned our son the job of investigating the best way to rid your yard of the colony as quickly and as painlessly as possible. After a little research on the internet, he discovered the best way is to set the hive on fire. (Okay....really the best way is to call an exterminator, but we didn't want to go that route). At first we were under the impression that we would 'smoke out' the wasps. But, our son was able to explain to us that because three elements are needed for fire (heat, fuel, and oxygen), the fire itself would draw the oxygen out of the hive making it necessary for the bees to escape. After one decent-sized fire, and a few traps for the stragglers, we've solved our yellow jacket problem. For this year, anyway.
I love real-life-backyard science!
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