RESCUE! VisiLure® TrapStik for Wasps, Mud Daubers, Carpenter Bees

The media could not be loaded. This is a very effective trap! However, the sounds the Texas mud daubers make stuck to this is … disturbing. Place this as far away from your patio as possible (to avoid the sounds) and in a few days every wasp/hornet will be stuck to the trap instead of flying around your patio into your windows and threatening to sting you.

I'm not having any of the problems the other reviews have stated. I put my first trap up, hanging from the overhang/roof of our deck and within a week it was completely full. It was covered with 90% paper wasps, 5% flies and 5% miscellaneous bugs - only one bumblebee which I was bummed about, but no honey bees. A few beetles, one moth, etc etc. The bird guard didn't affect its use efficacy in any way. I put a fresh one up today and will snap a picture and post it when it's full. Super effective, easy to use, 5/5 stars for me.*We are also on the third floor deck. So while I see a good amount of wasps, and have to deal with their nests, we don't often get honey bees that far away from the garden. We mostly get bombarded with carpenter bees and wasps each year. Maybe this is one of the reasons it works so well for us.

So, I just set this trap up last night and have been watching it kick-butt all day! I followed recommendations and didn't add the bird guard as it didn't seem like a risk on my porch and seemed like it would be more effective without it. I've had yellow jackets building a nest in my wall on my front porch this summer, which is also the only door in and out of the apartment. After several failed poisoning attempts because the nest was too deep in the wall, I followed professional advice to place traps outside the nest entrance to help reduce or eliminate the colony and to make it easier to treat the wall itself. I was concerned, however, about having a trap next to our only door, but I figured the nest itself is more dangerous and will grow worse as it gets later in the season, and there didn't seem to be any other easy stress-free solution to getting at the nest in the wall. This TrapStik was recommended as the best for both placing around human activity and for also being able to be placed close to nests. Well, halfway through the first day, there are already 50 yellow jackets stuck to this thing! It is no doubt doing its job. However, every time a yellow jacket gets stuck, it releases under-threat pheromones, which causes others to swarm around it to try to help it out. And sometimes some of them get stuck in that process, but mostly there are just a bunch of angry yellow jackets flying around the porch. I did extensive research on different traps and I wish I would've had a warning about that effect when placing this. So, for that reason I gave this 4 stars. It works as directed, but with risk. I think I'll have to remove it late tonight when the rest of the colony has retreated to the nest, and see about exploring other options. Which might mean more of these but getting creative about location with an apartment balcony/front door situation.

To watch insects of all types, good, bad and ugly, get stuck and try to free themselves was heartbreaking. I saw a carpenter bee get stuck, and after hours and hours of suffering, it freed itself by ripping its own legs off. It landed on the chair below and just sat there - still moving, but not going anywhere.The second day it was up, I decided enough was enough. A lizard (anole) got caught on the goopy wall and was laying completely flat, unable to move at all. I felt like the worst human being on the planet seeing it motionless except for its eyes. I wondered how much terror it must have been in.I immediately went online and find out how to free creatures from this material and saw that you can use vegetable oil. So I poured it all around him and used an old toothbrush to gently rub it around the stuck areas. He was finally able to free himself and run off.After that, I wrapped the device in a plastic bag and threw it away.This product works, it's just too much of a catch-all. It's painful to watch so many creatures get stuck and suffer. I will find another way to take care of the carpenter bees. IfIf you can live with the long suffering and eventual death of anything that touches the sticky material, then it's probably going to be something that will work great for you. It's just not for me.Just my opinion here. I realize there aren't too many ethical options for this sort of thing.