In continuing with Critter Week here at Sortova Farm, today’s lecture is on the common paper wasp.

Andrea woke me up early this morning, needing some help with the horses. Liesl and Mac both have their own stalls right next to each other, but whereas Mac tends to have a neat and clean stall, Liesl trashes hers.

She can be nervous in her stall, which leads to pacing, which results in the wood shavings on the floor being ground into a fine powder. Combined with moisture in the air, moisture from the horse, and perhaps a leaky barn, and it can get pretty nasty.

We had planned to change out the shavings this weekend, but we think that some type of insect was breeding in there, causing welts on Liesl, so we needed to change them sooner.

I’m getting to the wasps.

So while Andrea emptied out the stall, I hauled it all to the compost pile, and then replaced it with clean shavings.

We have an outbuilding we call the Cow Barn (’cause the previous owners kept cows there) and in one of the empty stalls we store the wood shavings. On my fifth and last trip, I felt a sharp sting on my left knee.

Many years ago while running a string trimmer, I hit a nest of yellow-jackets. They were not amused. Carl Lewis had nothing on me as I ran from the backyard to the house. I got away with only about six stings.

Thus, I’ve developed a surefire approach to dealing with stinging insects. I apply a liberal dose of “patty-cake”, followed by the RLH maneuver. In other words, I slap the affected area silly and run like hell.

How I missed the large nest of paper wasps in that stall in the Cow Barn is beyond me. I can only assume that it fell as I was shoveling shavings, but I must have angered at least one wasp. I managed to escape with a single sting, but man, it hurt, much more than a bee sting or yellow-jacket sting.

Andrea asked if I had ever been stung before, and I said “no”. Then I realized she was worried about an allergic reaction, which caused me to immediately mimic a seizure.

She just shook her head and said that considering how this week has gone, she’d probably just curl up in a fetal position on the floor.