Hi Deanna,

If you Google red wasp you will get more information than what you can read. :-) I entered red wasp on bugguide.net and came up with quite a few photos. The most pics that match the one I see all the time is the Paper Wasp.

I keep a spray bottle with soapy water handy to spray on wasps when they get close.

I've never seen a red wasp with a cat, but by the way they patrol milkweed and other host plants, it's fairly obvious that's what they do.

randy

Wasps are the only thing I can count on to control my infestation of sawfly larvae. As a matter of fact, when I used tulle netting to exclude the Japanese Beetles from my blooming roses, the rose slugs had a field day!

Ya can't win fer losing, that's fer sher.

The 'red wasp' (Polistes carolina) is one of the paper wasps and are caterpillar predators. Another species that will pack their nests full of caterpillars are the potter's wasps, though some of them prefer spiders.

I consider them a beneficial in my gardens, but I don't plant important host plants in order to raise caterpillars. The wasps sure went after the tent caterpillars a few months ago! ;-)

Randy, I was able to use your method of soap/water in a spray bottle the last 2 days, and kill 2 of the red wasps that I have caught with catepillars in mouth! Thank you for suggesting that. I keep my bottle on the front porch so when I see them, I can just grap it and run. This forces them to the ground where I can step on them to finish the deed.

Susan

Susan, was the caterpillar alright after that?

Greenhaven, I saw a product called Surround at Home in the Gardens Alive catalog that's supposed to help with Japanese Beetles. I've never used it, so I don't know if it works or not.

I looked up the red wasp on bugguide.net. I've never seen one of those in my yard. I wish they would have been around to get the tobacco budworms off my petunias last year! I've given up on growing petunias because by midsummer the budworms are so thick, I have no blooms.

I'm planting a butterfly garden next spring, including host plants. Since the wasps weren't around to take care of the budworms, maybe they won't be around to take away my caterpillars??? I don't spray pesticides, so I don't know why they wouldn't have been around.

Deanna

Here is a link that might be useful: Surround at Home

Deanna, the red wasps will eat any caterpillar they can capture. Doesn't matter if it's a budworm or a black swallowtail or anything else.

Randy is the one who suggested I use the soap/water spray (couple drops of dishwashing liquid to the bottle of water), and wait until they are away from the plants to spray them. This knocks them to the ground so you can safely step on them to rid them of the garden.

Other than this, I don't use pesticides at all because probably 99% of them will affect the butterfly caterpillars.

Hope this helps!

Susan

Has anyone tried hairspray on wasps?

Hairspray and a match sound more fun. :-)

pyro

Randy,

ROTFLMHO! What a visual!

OMG - Randy - ROTFLMAO! I thought of the Gas Plant when I saw your post - too much humor - heeheeheeheeheeheehee!

The BST cat in the red wasps grip did not survive - was already being consumed by the wasp so I wasn't able to save it. It was devouring it on the plant, too. I didn't want to spray the soapy water actually ON the plant (Randy suggested waiting until the wasp was away from the plant, which I did) because I was afraid the soapy residue would affect any eggs or cats in the vicinity. I guess you could spray it on the plant and then drench with water to remove the soap, though.

Susan

Last summer I sorayed the wasp with my water hose but the cats were always dead. I have caught wasps with a monarch cat 6 times. They are not only red but the yellow and brown striped ones. All colors seem to get them here.