Buzzing insect

[nboothe]

I have a strange problem at home and need some help identifying what might be in my walls without getting hurt. If I hit the wall below a window AC unit, I hear what sounds like a bee hive. It's a very loud buzzing sound like angry insects. There is no obvious activity of any kind outside around the window unit. I had my pest control company come out and they thought it was honey bees which are protected. I've called multiple beekeepers who are all confident that it's not bees because I'd see a bunch flying outside. They thought maybe yellow jackets but again I don't see anything flying around outside. Would termites make a sound like bees when irritated? There is no sound, at least that I can tell, unless I hit the wall. I really don't want to start making holes if I'm going to be attacked but I don't know how else do identify what it is? Any other insect that would buzz but not be flying around outside? Thanks in advance for any help!

Nathan

[leptraps]

The safest and easiest way to solve your problem. Call your local exterminator.

[kevinkk]

It sounds like you need someone smarter to assess the situation, so the pest guys come out, and say it's bees, the beekeepers say it's
not bees, because you'd see some outside...
Personally, I disagree that you'd necessarily see insects outside.
They could be getting in some other way.
Try setting a wasp trap, or setting out a saucer with some sweet liquid nearby.
I hate to see people throw away money for "pest control", one time I answered a local bulletin board ad
because someone had a yellowjacket nest in their shed, I answered it and said- I'd do it for you, and I wouldn't pay
someone more than 20 bucks to collect a simple nest.
I went there after dark, scooped it into my big butterfly net and that was that. I still have the nest.
Pest control is a racket, they keep coming back, the ants, the spiders, the rats, the mice, it's like a
"controlled burn" there's no such thing.

Another thing occurred to me- electrical issues might sound like buzzing. Without hearing the noise, or what prompted you to strike

the wall, it's in the realm of possibility. I'm not sure who'd be more expensive...an electrician or the Orkin man..

You could try unplugging the unit and see if you can get the sound to occur.

[bandrow]

Greetings,

I had a similar experience a couple of years ago. I would notice a low humming noise in the wall of an upstairs bedroom in the early morning during the summer. I couldn't pinpoint the source and finally just ignored it, thinking it could be the aluminum siding on the house expanding in the morning sunlight - it faced south. I saw no evidence of bees anywhere around the house.

A year or two later, we had to replace our electric junction box in the basement, and the electrician had to run a new main line. When he tried to push the line through the wall, something was blocking it, so he opened up the wall. Inside was a dead yellowjacket nest - from joist to joist (24") and at least 3' high. When active, it must have had a couple thousand "residents". Had that thing been active when he opened that wall, it would have been a hornet tornado in the house!

The hive was in the lower floor, and at the opposite end of the room from where I heard it in the upstairs bedroom. They had gained access through a hole no more than 1/2" wide in some dried-rotted caulk around where the main electrical line entered a brick wall, coming from the outside meter . The meter was partially hidden from view by some shrubbery which also hid the yellowjacket activity.

Industrious little critters!

Cheers!
Bandrow