Forest Parish

Asian hornet report – 2025

The Asian Hornet Team (AHT) are pleased to report on another successful year. We would like to thank members of the public for staying vigilant throughout the year and beekeepers who monitored their hives for Asian hornets. It is well known that hornets target beehives, but we have

had no evidence of any honeybee colonies dying out as a direct consequence of Asian hornet in Guernsey. Controlling these invasive hornets is vital to protect our islands native pollinators.

To summarise the year, we are relieved to say that after very high numbers of queens caught in the spring, a total number of eight large nests were found this year – the average from 2019-25 is six nests/year. Compared to other regions (e.g., Jersey have already reported finding over 550 nests),

the situation in Guernsey appears to remain under control. Annual eradication continues to be an achievable goal and there is no evidence that this invasive pest is established on our island.

Since the first confirmed sighting on April 5th, the States funded Asian Hornet Team have received and verified over 450 reports this year of which 170 (38%) were confirmed sightings of Asian hornets reported from either Guernsey, Sark, Herm or Alderney.

To summarise, the island wide “Spring Queening” programme accounted for 69 hornet queens these arrive from France every year after flying 30 miles across the sea. Eight primary nests were found during May-June, and by the end of October eight larger secondary nests were located, destroyed, and removed across six parishes: St Peter Port (2), St Martins (1), Castel (1), St Sampsons (1), St Peters (1) and Vale (2) which proves hornets can turn up anywhere. All eight secondary nests were in trees apart from the one in St Peters, in a field boundary hedge.

Spring Queening” trapping programme

Trap numbers and trapping period

A total of 265 Spring Queening traps were set and checked daily by trained volunteers, the 500m spacing ensures island-wide coverage

Trapping period April 1st - June 10th = 10 weeks

Queen hornets captured/found at properties

o Guernsey = 69 queens; 49 - SQ traps, 20 - properties

o Sark = 137 queens; 129 - SQ traps, 8 - properties

o Herm = 3 queens SQ traps

o Alderney = 365 queens

o Jersey = 1376 queens

Guernsey queens trapped by parish:

Vale = 10, St Peters = 7, St Martins = 14, St Peter Port = 7, Castel = 15, St Sampsons = 2 ,

St Andrews = 1, St Saviours = 4, Torteval = 6, Forest = 2, unknown; queen found in trap = 1

8 primary nests found, (includes 2 abandoned nests where queen had deserted or deceased).

Secondary nests tracked, destroyed and removed.

Maintaining health and safety

There was only one reported stinging incident attributed to Asian hornets during 2025 and that occurred whilst a member of the AHT was undertaking the removal of a large hornet nest.

Following a thorough review process the incident was attributed to a failure of the PPE and all pairs of protective gloves were upgraded to a higher specification.

Conclusion

Despite an increase in the numbers of queens captured in 2025 the resulting numbers of secondary nests remained under the threshold of 10 nests/year as stipulated in the Asian Hornet Strategy.

This indicates that there is sufficient resilience built into the Asian Hornet Strategy to deal with peak incursion year provided the resources and efforts to control this hornet are maintained.

What to do if you think you have seen a hornet

For further information on identifying Asian hornets, please visit https://www.gov.gg/asianhornet

If you see or trap a hornet, please let us know asap and do send in a photo to asianhornet@gov.gg

or 07839 197082 so that we can confirm what you suspect might be an Asian hornet.

NEVER attempt to tackle a nest yourself. We have all the resources, PPE and expertise to safely destroy all Asian hornet’s nests found in Guernsey, Herm and Sark.