Type of wasp

[spudqueen]

A single wasp has built a little nest on the inside of the roof of my wooden garage. It is about 2 inches long and looks like a little chinese paper lantern. Presumably this isn't your common or garden wasp as there are hundreds (or thousands) of them in one nest. But can anyone tell me what kind of wasp it will be?

[Clanad]

Many different kinds of wasps exist, with widely varying habits and structural characteristics. They may be divided into the social wasps and the solitary wasps. Social wasps include the hornets, the yellow jackets, and the large, mahogany-colored wasps known as the paper wasps; they live in communities consisting of males, females, and sterile workers. The solitary wasps, including the mud daubers, potter wasps, and digger wasps, produce no workers and build individual nests. The nesting habits of the solitary wasps are extremely diverse. The potter wasps build vaselike cells of clay attached to the twig of a tree. The mud daubers construct mud cells in sheltered places; the digger wasps burrow into the soil and sometimes in decaying wood. Solitary wasps generally provide the cells with spiders, caterpillars, or flies stung through the nerve center and thus rendered helpless. In this way, the young insects are provided with fresh food. The digger wasp taps down the earth with pebbles to fill the mouth of its burrow. Scientific classification: Wasps belong to the order Hymenoptera. (From Wasp Facts)

[Mrs_Pegasus]

Hi There

I think you probably have the queen building the home for her 100's and 1,000's!  Nests are only ever used once, the queen starts them off, lays the eggs and produces the workers.  You will end up with a large nest with many occupants, personally I would look to have it removed ASAP.

[EssJay1]

A wasp started to build a nest in my garden shed a couple of years ago. I sprayed it with Raid - wasp killer - and it went away and never came back. Wasps are designed to have babies - survival of the fittest and all that - so get rid of it as soon as you can. You don't need to spray the wasp, just the nest, making it inhospitable and waspie moves away.