Our family spends a great deal of time (and water) waging a futile war against the ground bees that share our real estate. We are totally aware in our heads that we're being stupid, but we can't overcome the impulse inside to keep trying to win the battle.
They are totally uninvited guests. Our house is at the bottom of a nice gentle sloping hill. Apparently, the exact type of place ground bees like to nest. In three years, we've never been attached, heck, even bothered. They couldn't care less that we are around.
The first year we were here, Brian and I would chase them with a can of Raid that would spray up to 20 feet away. It was fun to watch them dive bomb and then totally crash after they had enough of poison soaking their tough little bodies. We went through LOTS of cans that summer. Ben thought it was cool that as soon as Dad came home from work, he could watch out the bay window and see him fight the daily battle.
Year two they came back. I was so mad! I even took it to the community association to see what they could do for us since the field in front of our house was swarming with hundreds of bees. It was there, that I really learned about them. Basically, they'll never really go away. They have been tormenting our hill forever and no one has ever been stung. They did send an exterminator out, but the word was that his poison would work for a week but they babies would hatch and we would be back to square one.
Mr. Exterminator did educate us a little bit as did the internet. Basically, I should ignore the big monster bees. They will all be dead in 2 weeks anyway. Concentrate my efforts on killing the babies by flooding the underground tunnels they dig to lay the eggs. So, every morning, all summer long for two years, we go outside with Ben and "water the bees". Ben thinks it is a blast. It was actually reasonable effective, but realize the size of the problem I was fighting is huge. One single morning when I went out, I counted 52 NEW bee holes that had appeared overnight.
Last night, Brian decided to water the bees with Ben around 9pm. I think he stumbled onto a genius plan. He flooded the holes like we always do. The difference was, that he took Ben's shoe and crouched down next to the holes as he filled them. Eventually, a huge bee would come coughing and spattering out of the holes. SPLAT! Brian would pound on them and squish them. Even if it doesn't really matter if we kill the adults, it sure does feel GREAT!! Plus, that one can't lay eggs anymore.
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