Carpenter Bee Load

[Frank V]

I am in CA and I do have my back against the Pacific Ocean, laying in the Chalk Outline... No room left here, visitors go home! Stay Home!

Randy

That's kind of how I feel.
Saw a bumper sticker one time at a friends town it said if it's tourist season how come I can't shoot one?
Kind of laughed.


Hey did I start a new page?

[barney67]

Used to shoot them when they were in hover mode with my BB gun when I was a kid, now I want a salt gun.

Didn't read the entire thread, so forgive me if this has been mentioned before. WD 40 up the bore hole kills them PDQ, my understanding is that the non stinging males are the ones buzzing around outside the hole while the stinger bearing females are busy chewing away inside. The males have a yellow dot on their head and the females are slightly smaller without the dot, at least in my neck of the woods.

[mto7464]

kind of late to the thread and did not read it all but had the same problem and found that painting the raw wood stopped them from boring. I plug all the existing holes with caulk. They still tried a couple of times but stopped after just starting the hole.

[Frank V]

Hehe ten pages on Carpenter Bees.
The salt gun does sound like fun though, might leave a mess of salt indoors though??????

[W.R.Buchanan]

It only shoots a small pinch of salt at a time. You have 1000's of times more dirt on your floors. Now if you shot it hundreds of times in your living room eventually you would start seeing some buildup, but if you had that many bugs in your living room you'd have much bigger problems than the salt.

Randy

[luvtn]

Hehe ten pages on Carpenter Bees.
The salt gun does sound like fun though, might leave a mess of salt indoors though??????

Them carpenter bees are serious stuff!
Luvtn

[Frank V]

It only shoots a small pinch of salt at a time. You have 1000's of times more dirt on your floors. Now if you shot it hundreds of times in your living room eventually you would start seeing some buildup, but if you had that many bugs in your living room you'd have much bigger problems than the salt.

Randy

He he guess you are right......
A small puff of salt wouldn't hurt much. Wonder how it'd be to salt your eggs??? Probably ought to make sure the yolk isn't runny?

Never had experience with carpenter bees, Meat bees yes & they are really a pain. The salt gun should be great on either.

[Down South]

For you guys wanting to try the salt gun on carpenter bee's. You might just Pi$$ them off. I'm not sure one of these things has the horsepower to take one out even at close range. Fly's are a different story. The salt gun will take em out at 3-4 Ft. A carpenter bee is a lot tougher. A salt load out of a pellet rifle as mentioned in a previous post would probably work at closer ranges.
I use a homemade bee bat, "When the bee is in range" or a bee load from my 357 or 44 Mag.
Just my $.02.

[W.R.Buchanan]

Just my opinion here but isn't a .44 anything a little over-gunned for a bee? I can see if is was one of those Japanese Super Hornets that can kill you,,, but a regular sized bee?

I like the bat idea as it probably has a very satisfying splat accompanying connection, but it would certainly require much more skill to execute. They're pretty quick at getting out of the way.

Randy

[Down South]

Just my opinion here but isn't a .44 anything a little over-gunned for a bee? I can see if is was one of those Japanese Super Hornets that can kill you,,, but a regular sized bee?

I like the bat idea as it probably has a very satisfying splat accompanying connection, but it would certainly require much more skill to execute. They're pretty quick at getting out of the way.

Randy

Not really overkill with the 44. About the same powder charge, just a pinch of powder. It really depends on how you load them. I built a tool to drive a gas check down in the brass for a wad over the powder charge, fill with your favorite charge of seed, tumbler media, rat shot, etc. Place a second gas check upside down on the top and crimp. You can use cardboard wads if you like, Make a punch out of an old 44 case, sharpen the edge and go to work making wads. You can seal the top with cardboard, wax or other material.

[Frank V]

Not really overkill with the 44. About the same powder charge, just a pinch of powder. It really depends on how you load them. I built a tool to drive a gas check down in the brass for a wad over the powder charge, fill with your favorite charge of seed, tumbler media, rat shot, etc. Place a second gas check upside down on the top and crimp. You can use cardboard wads if you like, Make a punch out of an old 44 case, sharpen the edge and go to work making wads. You can seal the top with cardboard, wax or other material.

I like .44s!

[jonp]

Can't believe I remembered this thread. We have a bunch of carpenter bees that have shown up and are boring holes in the fascia on the porch. My wife and I were trying to figure out what to do and I said "how about the shotgun, wait a sec...." and remembered this thread. Loading up some 38sp and trying some cornmeal first.

[jsizemore]

Southern Style with Mike

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=al1CAR96WIc

[GooseGestapo]

I think this is my first time on this thread, so here goes....
I use two .410 shotguns with .45Colt brass loaded with 5.0gr of Bullseye and card wads cut with a 7/16" punch.
I use a full case of Walnut hull media and crimped over-shot wad. From full choked .410, they're good to 20-25feet. For "longer" range, I was given some Turkish #10 (measures to US #11). its good to 50-60feet, but WILL damage facia boards!. Don't ask how I know. But then so do the Carpenter Bees.
I have out a half dozen traps, and have caught 40-50 so far this year. Killed that many more with a tennis racquet. Have gotten 61 with .410/.45 Walnut hull media. Corn cob or grits works too, but not as good as Walnut hull. Tried other powders. Nothing as good as Bullseye.
.45colt brass may need to be driven with out shell holder fully to rim in a sizer for easy extraction. I do this by using a 1/2" wrench laid over the shell holder to drive the case into a carbide .45 die with decapper assembly removed, then drive out with steel rod punch.
Ive got 30 dedicated cases. Need to run another batch as I shot them all up Tuesday am. I like to use corrugated cardboard over powder, primer sleeve cardboard over shot. No need for shellac sealant. Little louder than a cap pistol.

[Possum Lickaa]

I heartily recommend the Bug-A-Salt, a pump action pneumatic salt gun:

http://www.amazon.com/Bug-A-Salt-Fir.../dp/B00AB88UDA

I've used it in the house against house flies and fruit flies and outside against wasps. It's light weight and long enough to give good aiming sense without sighting down the thing. Like shooting a long barreled Winchester 97.

Also sets the 'tone of the house' when visitors see it for the first time sitting on the kitchen counter.

+1 on the effectiveness of the Bug A Salt. I live in city limits, and using a firearm on those buggers is out of the question. But seriously, If I could load and shoot my own bug ammo like some of you guys, that plastic pump-action salt gun would be in a landfill somewhere. I'm jealous!!!

[kyswede]

I decided to try my luck at carpenter bee loads. I used 2 grains of Red Dot, a disc cut from legal pad backing, 1.3 cc scoop of used tumbling media (corn cob), with a top wad cut from a foam plate, crimped. Worked great using a shoe box lid as a target. About 1 in 5 shots would set primer back and bind the cylinder in my 2" barrel 38 Special. So I drilled primer holes out to 1/8" and cut powder back to 1.6 grains. No primer set back. I will try to load pics.

[kyswede]

Too cool for bees today so I used shoe box lid as a target.

[GooseGestapo]

Up the powder charge to 3.0gr. This will set the case back reseating the primers and avoid the backed out primers. No need to drill a perfectly good case.
I used Speers data for their shotshell loads as starting data. 3gr of Bullseye did same thing in the .45colt. I use 5.0.

[gwpercle]

I solved my carpenter bee , drilling holes in the exposed rafters, problem by hanging up a couple Carpenter Bee Houses . We put up hives for the honey bee's so I thought I would do the same for these unloved guys. They do prefer the pre-fab bee house to drilling holes in my exposed roof rafters, so I guess it's working. They do a good job of pollinating, we watch them in the fruit , vegetable and flower gardens...I felt bad about just killing them.
Gary

[Smk SHoe]

Over here in the carolina's they don't like the prefab bee houses. They like my log cabin. Painting all exposed wood has helped but they little buggers will find any little crease to start boring. Gonna start loading some 44's with walnut media in the morning.