We’ve had three yellow jacket colonies on the property in the last few years — one out in the back yard in the ground, two taking up residence inside one of the house walls. The first colony in the wall we didn’t really even know was there until Kent got stung, having riled the nest defenders for sweeping leaves off the porch. Kent declared war, eventually tearing away the cedar shingle siding to get the last of them out. The ground nest lasted a year, then died or moved on. We have just finished killing off the other yellow jacket colony that decided our house wall made a good home. I suppose we don’t know that we’ve gotten them all yet. But Kent doesn’t want to rip open the wall this time. After an extended assault with a shop vacuum (the yellow jackets get sucked in and drown in a pool of soapy water) and the stuffing up of their holes with steel wool, it looks like the colony has been vanquished. ... Though a few rather dazed individuals keep showing up.
When I came across Maria Melendez’s poem, “Recipe for When You’re Tired of Feeding Your Family Cereal from a Box,” about harvesting a yellow jacket nest for food, it made me perk up. We could have eaten them?
In the instructions stanza Mendez says you build a fire near the entrance of a ground nest, then “Push smoke down the hole with the wide fan you wove last winter. After the yellow jackets are paralyzed by the smoke, dig out the nest. Carry it to a prepared bed of coals. Roast the nest. Shake out the dead larvae onto a basket tray. Mash them, then boil in a basket with hot stones. Drain and serve with manzanita berries.”
Sounds like American Indian cuisine. Whoever figured out this recipe had to be pretty nervy.
I wonder how many larvae are still in our wall.
source: New Poets of the American West
edited by Lowell Jaeger
2010. Many Voices Press, Flathead Valley Community College, Kalispell, MT
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