First Murder Hornet Nest in US Destroyed

[Milchshake]

When fighting off an invasion of insectoid horrors, I was expecting more plasteel and bolters.



"The eradication went very smoothly, even though our original plan had to be adapted due to the fact that the nest was in a tree, rather than the ground," managing entomologist Sven Spichiger said on Monday. "While this is certainly a morale boost, this is only the start of our work to hopefully prevent the Asian giant hornet from gaining a foothold in the Pacific Northwest. We suspect there may be more nests in Whatcom County."

Entomologists originally spotted the nest in a tree cavity near Blaine, Washington, after they trapped, tagged and tracked a live Asian giant hornet back to its nest.

Really hoping for a heavy winter this year to hopefully slow the bugs down.

[draynay]

They had to catch and release a few of them before being successfully led back to the nest, but it worked out eventually.

There are plenty worse invasive pests, but its still nice to see countermeasures succeed.

[YUPPIE]

There are plenty worse invasive pests, but its still nice to see countermeasures succeed.

no there aren't. There really isn't worse than Hornets.

[cubby]

They had to catch and release a few of them before being successfully led back to the nest, but it worked out eventually.

There are plenty worse invasive pests, but its still nice to see countermeasures succeed.

I love that dental floss played a pivotal role.

[draynay]

no there aren't. There really isn't worse than Hornets.

Never let your ignorance stop you making another ignorant post.

[cubby]

Never let your ignorance stop you making another ignorant post.

Care to explain your disagreement with the invasive species? Those Murder Hornets can eviscerate a honeybee hive in a matter of hours, with just a few of them. And if I'm remembering correctly, honey bees are a pretty key aspect of the environment.

[Shadowferal]

Ya...probably at or near the top of the list of invasive species that no one would miss if it went extinct.

[draynay]

Care to explain your disagreement with the invasive species? Those Murder Hornets can eviscerate a honeybee hive in a matter of hours, with just a few of them. And if I'm remembering correctly, honey bees are a pretty key aspect of the environment.

Honeybees are a commercial insect, at least in the US since they are invasive from Europe/Asia.

Anyway, talking about Asian Giant Hornets is less interesting when there are other bigger problems like Spotted Lanternfly, Asian Citrus Psyllid, Palm Weevils, or Brown marmorated stinkbugs which are already established significant environmental pests. They just don't have a catchy nickname.

I don't think the hornets pose as great a risk as some of them, its good a nest was eradicated, I just like to latch onto this exaggerated fervor to point out some bigger problems.

[Shadowferal]

Hopefully those hornets will continue to be a non-threat...as they get killed off fast.

[announced]

I hate hornets. I wish they would use more destructive means to kill the bugs like a flamethrower, but I understand how dangerous that can be so I guess a vacuum would have to do.

[freezion]

Care to explain your disagreement with the invasive species? Those Murder Hornets can eviscerate a honeybee hive in a matter of hours, with just a few of them. And if I'm remembering correctly, honey bees are a pretty key aspect of the environment.

Pollinators, including wild bees, are a key aspect of the environment.
Honey bees on the other hand is domesticated and also a competitor and in some cases a threat to wild and solitary bees.
Honey bees do occur wild some places in europe, but hives are vastly smaller than the domestic ones and they are more selective in their choice of plants.
Just some perspective: there's roughly 23000 species of bees, and people assume it's the only species that give a product usable by humans thats the important one (and roughly 10-ish species in total produces harvestable honey).

Wild bees pollinate at a higher rate (10-100x higher than domestic honey bees), pollinate better and as a result causes higher fruit formation rates on plants, larger fruit and more viable seeds.
Honey bees are only really a key aspect of commercial farming/fruit plantations because they are easier to manage and move around than wild bee species and gives a marketable byproduct. Bumblebees are used in some greenhouses in europe, but doesn't really seem to have caught on in the US.

Other invasive species in the US like the gypsy moth is a much bigger threat to both the nature and industry (they managed to defoliate 2mil acres of forest over a three year period).
Other notable species:
Africanized bees
Ashborers
Formosian thermites
Zebra mussel

All of them is probably a bigger threat ecologically in the US, but probably also for industry.

EDIT: with that being said, the asian giant hornet is invasive as well, and needs to be kept under control if possible, but its not on the top of the list in relation to being a immediate threat that needs to be dealth with before other invasive species.

[Yuujin]

Pollinators, including wild bees, are a key aspect of the environment.
Honey bees on the other hand is domesticated and also a competitor and in some cases a threat to wild and solitary bees.
Honey bees do occur wild some places in europe, but hives are vastly smaller than the domestic ones and they are more selective in their choice of plants.
Just some perspective: there's roughly 23000 species of bees, and people assume it's the only species that give a product usable by humans thats the important one (and roughly 10-ish species in total produces harvestable honey).

Wild bees pollinate at a higher rate (10-100x higher than domestic honey bees), pollinate better and as a result causes higher fruit formation rates on plants, larger fruit and more viable seeds.
Honey bees are only really a key aspect of commercial farming/fruit plantations because they are easier to manage and move around than wild bee species and gives a marketable byproduct. Bumblebees are used in some greenhouses in europe, but doesn't really seem to have caught on in the US.

Other invasive species in the US like the gypsy moth is a much bigger threat to both the nature and industry (they managed to defoliate 2mil acres of forest over a three year period).
Other notable species:
Africanized bees
Ashborers
Formosian thermites
Zebra mussel

All of them is probably a bigger threat ecologically in the US, but probably also for industry.

EDIT: with that being said, the asian giant hornet is invasive as well, and needs to be kept under control if possible, but its not on the top of the list in relation to being a immediate threat that needs to be dealth with before other invasive species.

Damn, nature.

[Jonnusthegreat]

no there aren't. There really isn't worse than Hornets.

Mussels are pretty bad.

[Pony Soldier]

Well I suppose it's a start but I feel like for every nest they destroy 10 more are made. By the time it took to take down this one nest these hornets probably have hundreds of nests all over the country.

Call me pessimistic but I don't think we'll ever actually get rid of them. Just like we'll never get rid of those fucking lantern flies. Thanks China.

[Mormolyce]

Turns out being overrun with murder hornets is the least the US has to worry about in 2020.

[Masser]

Humans need to stop playing God.

[Verdugo]

Humans need to stop playing God.

That is not going to happen, so might as well get good at it.

[MikeBogina]

Care to explain your disagreement with the invasive species? Those Murder Hornets can eviscerate a honeybee hive in a matter of hours, with just a few of them. And if I'm remembering correctly, honey bees are a pretty key aspect of the environment.

I agree that hornets are bad, but aren't honeybees an invasive species to America and aren't they causing the extinction of other pollinators? I could be wrong, I feel like I'm remembering this from a Film Theory xD

[Overlord Anrakyr]

What happened to due process? You're just gonna make a wild accusation and then proceed straight to the execution?