Ugh how horrible John 
I didnât think of the midair grabs they would be capable of. Sorry to hear youâre on crutches - speedy recovery!!
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Somehow my hive continues to survive, though in very poor shape. I put a anti robbing screen on it and, for 5 successive days, had thousands of bees all over it and finding their way inside. All this while the murder hornets kept coming at 10 minute intervals. Between my son and I we have killed probably 150 of them (5-10 per day)- they are very successful at catching bees and carrying them off but they are very easy to kill and docile around us when away from their own nest. I wrote to the local authorities but got a âwe may be slow to replyâ auto message (holiday season). Yesterday I read that a nearby council were congratulating themselves on destroying a nest in rocks at a local beach but I truly believe they have no idea of the scale of the invasion. Friend of mine see them in their garden and every time my son goes up to the hive he sees 4 or 5 just waiting on the landing board he kills them every time. These things are like Africanised bees - you are going to have a serious problem in the USA if you have already destroyed a couple of nests. Incidientally, I still havenât found our local nest but I suspect there may be more than 1 in the forest bear by. I am going to wait until next April, get another nuc, hope that the authorities have taken an interest by then, and have my third go at being successful at having a healthy colony here in Portugal!
John, this is so troubling. I appreciate you posting these pictures that show the scale of these creatures in relation to a hive - very sobering, but hopefully galvanizing. I think you should send this post to your local news & maybe the ag authorities will be forced to act.
I too am not very impressed by the latest headline about a single murder hornet nest finally being located and destroyed here in the US. Any beekeeper knows itâs the tip of an iceberg.
It is encouraging to hear that you and your son are able to kill them fairly easily - what do you use, a frying pan?! 
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Hi Eva
Actually, I just cut a plastic lid off a small bucket, drilled holes in it and wired it onto a bamboo cane which I split in halfâŚBut thatâs only because I broke my regular fly swatter, had the stuff to make another one easily, and it is somewhat bigger!! But you are right⌠I think they are here to stay and the only thing I could find in my research is that certain buzzards and larger hornets eat them. (which effectively means that they are top of the food chain where I live, I think)
Oh dang! I didnât even think of there being LARGER ones 
Today I found the murder hornet nest and sent my drone to take photos. Itâs in the top of a pine tree about 100m from my property. The photo doesnât show any wasps but the video the drone took picked them up (too big a file size). The nest is about 1.5 times the size of a basketball. I wrote to the rele
vant authorities but I guess they donât work week ends!
I didnât think that Vespa mandarina built nest like this - their nests are typically underground or in cavities.
I looked and I donât see that Asian giant hornets (Vespa mandarina) have been reported in Western Europe.
Vespa velutina nigrithorax or the Asian hornet does build nests like this and has been spreading across Europe since 2004 since accidental introduction in France.
The Asian murder hornet is what I am talking about, and they have become a very real and recent nuisance in Western Europe (certainly Portugal). The one pictured on a piece of wire is what I am referring to and they devour bees. The mayor of the local council was making a big fuss about having found a nest and having it destroyed, but they are new to this area and they are spreading quickly
Vespa Velutina is, I guess, what I am referring to. But they still call it the Asian murder hornet. It was first discovered in Portugal in 2010 and is known to attack people and kill bees. I guess that the term -murder hornetâ may have been applied to this species too, for some reason. So I guess you are correct Chau06. It is still the hornet that the people are trying to get rid of. I would be interested to know exactly what the hornet is that was discovered in the USA, because I see pictures all the time and they look identical to what you described. As for 'giant hornets, I have only ever seen such things in BruneiâŚand I was the recipient of 5 painful stings that had me under intense medical supervison for 24 hours.
I do not believe that Vespa velutina has been found in the US. A few nests of Vespa mandarina have been found in Washington state and British Columbia.
https://agr.wa.gov/departments/insects-pests-and-weeds/insects/hornets/data
well Iâll be very surprised if it is âunder controlâ. Once youâve seen a few then it may as well be covid - they will be everywhere before too long! so we have two Asian invasions, in terms of wasps!
Agreed. Very concerning. On the plus side, the Asian giant hornets are big enough to radio tag! 
Well done John in finding the nest, I guess your local authorities will deal with it. If they donât & your not in a bush fire zone, if itâs safe to do so, you can put a fire on the end of a long pole if it will reach before placing it under the nest to burn them out.
Thanks Jeff. The problem is that my neighbor is a cantankerous old lady who wouldnât let me near her placeâŚand we have a very real fire risk at the moment, specially since the nest is in a pine forest. (The tree itself, I have noticed, is not a pine). I will wait for someone to take it seriously and if they donât show up then I will walk down the road and let the old lady know. She may be brave enough to climb the tree and have a go! Sorry, I am not that nasty a person!
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oh no! You could always upload your video to YouTube and post the link. 
Hi John, well at least you know now where the nest is. Maybe you could soften the old lady with a packet of Tim Tams if the authorities do nothing & you get past the fire season, if you decide to tackle it yourself.
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If you canât find Tim Tams in Europe, you could try Penguin biscuits instead from a British food shop. They are very similar - 2 crunchy thin wafers with a layer of creamy filling and then dipped in chocolate. 
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Hi Dawn, I got that idea from a clever ad on tv. A couple of kids gave a lady chocolate biscuits so they could retrieve their ball from her yard 
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Dark Chocolate McVities Digestive Biscuits would work very well on this little old ladyâŚ
Oreos might work in the US too, but Tim Tams, Penguins and Dark Choc McVities are all better
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Maybe theyâre waiting for some Tim Tams 
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