Have you ever been bitten by a wasp?

It bit you as opposed to stinging you? Never been bitten by a wasp.

^ Yep. I was watching closely, it had its mouth on my skin. It hurt a lot less than being stung, but I did not enjoy the experience.

I had been feeding the dogs some treats before. Maybe it wanted to eat me because I smelled like meat?

I’ve only been stung. Ouch.

That could be. They can pick up on scents.

You were very unlucky. I think that you are exactly right that your hand smelled like meat. Here’s what a biologist says:

“In short, the ‘wasps’ as a group have diverse uses for their ‘stings’ but none of the social wasps bite as a defence mechanism and as far as I’m aware, none of the other wasps bite for anything other than prey dismemberment. Here is a brief overview I’ve just found about Hymenoptera: http://www.sel.barc.usda.gov/hym/overview.html"

Never bitten. Stung once by either a bee or wasp. It was traumatizing enough to make me not a fan of driving in a car with open windows now (since that is how I was stung, and that was over 30 years ago).

My ex-wife. She was episcopalian.

Wasps sting, maybe you had a yellow jacket or meat bee on your hand. They can sting but prefer to bite. They are attracted to meat, pet food, as they are little carnivores. Yes, I have been bitten and stung by both and bees also. The Yellow Jacket bite is much better than a wasp or hornet sting.

I’ve been stung a few times, never bitten.

Seems the wasp was trying to eat you, not warn you away. I wouldn’t have the patience to watch a wasp bite me. I would be busy trying to kill it.

I have been stung 3 times, but never bitten.

@Dutchess_III You’ve only been stung three times in your life? I stepped on a nest one time by accident. I think I got it 19 or 20 times. You lose count at a certain point.

^^^^^^^^^ Nature wants you dead. ^^^^^^

@Here2_4 I think it’s beyond that at this point. I think Mother Nature just thinks of ways to screw with people and I’m the testing subject.

Gimminy @Adirondackwannabe! That could have killed you! Maybe you just need to go live in a bubble where the bats and wasps can’t get you.
Yep, only three times. Stepped on one in a pile of leaves. Reached into a mailbox the second time. I don’t remember the third time, but it was on my hand, too. That hurts a lot. I can’t imagine 19 or 20 all at once.

I don’t know how many it takes to kill someone, but that wasn’t fun. I was pretty shockey. They’d probably send me to the ER today, but we weren’t that smart.

We just didn’t do the ER thing very often, did we @Adirondackwannabe. In fact, the only ER visit I can recall is when my youngest sister was bitten by a water moccasin.

I sliced the top of my ankle open once, on a bike fender, and it required stitches, but it was done in the doctor’s office, not the ER. Must have happened on a work day.

Wait…when we lived in Florida we had pneumatic door hinges that SNAPPED shut at the last second. I was running in to see JFK’s funeral, and my little sister was right behind me. She had her hand on the hinge side when it snapped shut. Cut off the tip of her pinky finger. I don’t remember what happened after that. I’m sure it was an ER visit, tho.

Also, same sister, my Mom accidentally dropped a glass bottle of milk (they were delivered to our door by the milkman in dem days) and it shattered on the floor…and my sister stepped on it! I’m sure that was an ER visit, but I don’t remember.

Same sister also snapped her femur when she fell off the curb. She was wearing one of those metal POW bracelets and that’s what did it.

I was chopping wood one time and a piece of wood landed on a near by wasp nest. They swarmed me and I got out of there as fast as I could. By the time I made it to safety I was stung and BITTEN several times. The wasps removed a small chunk of skin with every bite.

Ouch.

Yellow jackets and I have a problem with one another. They walk on the picnic table under my arm and…No wait, reverse that. But I ended up with the welts!
I had the coolest two experiences with wasps though. Dumb luck.
– I was cleaning the gutters out of my place back in Dayton. It was a cool Fall day, and I was almost finished. Down a bit, in the gutter, was a nest of wasps mixed in with the gutter and the top of a prickly shrub tree that was due to be cut back, just near the corner. As I came closer, a couple of wasps flew out of their abode on my abode, and sat on the gutter’s edge- just like they were staring at me. No agression, but plenty of attitude. So two feet of gutter did not get finished that year.
– Trimming the front hedges with electric blade clippers. A lot of vibrating to the hedges as you go. Black and Decker’s savage blades! I saw a section of a wasp’s nest- in the honey-combed shape with just four chambers placed around a branch of the shrub. There was a full grown Mommy(?) holding on a branch above them. I timmed near, but used a pair of hedge clippers all around her. Flat top shrubs- one branch sticking up about 4 inches. Wasp on top. As I worked, the wasp just calmly watched me trimming. She kept me in front of her, no matter what angle I worked. We just both did our jobs, no big deal. It’s the closest I’ve ever been to a wasp.
It was close to 90 degrees out. She was in the sun. So, rembering something about wasps from eons ago, I put a terra cotta saucer of water out on the porch nearby for her in the shade. She came right over to it after I went inside. Holding on to the rim, she leaned down to the water. It was so cool being 2–3 inches working around her- she was so calm- beautifully frightening. It was really fascinating. She was probably thinking: stupid human…come just a little closer and you die!

This is interesting, for some reason I never even thought of a wasp biting or even being able to!

Me either, @rojo

^ Yep. That’s why I was curious enough to ask.

Thanks, all!

Perhaps you need some lotion, @longgone?
“Wood fibers are gathered from weathered wood, softened by chewing and mixing with saliva.”
“Wasps cannot digest proteins.”

Source.

^ Lotion? I’m confused.

Perhaps the wasp mistook your palm for weathered wood? @longgone
It certainly wasn’t looking for a bite of meat to eat.

Unrelated but interesting: this fall I’m averaging about 1 wasp in the house every 3 days. As many as 2–3 a day. Never seen the like before.

^ Ah, got it. No idea.