I have a small, 2-step plastic mounting block and this morning, when I moved it to get ready to get on my gelding…uh oh! I saw a couple of yellow jackets fly out. Upon further inspection, I found a decent sized yellow jack nest under the step AND a small hornet nest. Who would of thought those two parties would decide to cohabitate? Anyway, this could have been disastrous, even for my pretty chill dude, so a word of warning to give mounting blocks an eyeball on the regular!
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I’ll add check trailers!
I was getting ready to load a horse when I saw a yellowjacket fly out from the spare 
After spraying the bejeesus out of that, I checked inside the trailer.
Also patrol fenceposts & under barn eaves.
Stinkin’ cranky wasps! 
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Check for spiders in the mounting block handle recess before you stick your fingers in there to move it.
Favorite wasp nest spots in my dressage arena are inside the white vinyl boards, just inside the ends and entered by the small gaps between the boards.
Don’t forget to treat fire ant beds under and around the letter cones and board supports.
Under the canopies of my tractor and UTV are other frequent wasp nest build sites.
But don’t overlook the beneficial role of wasps as predators of other harmful insects like flies and caterpillars and also their role as pollinators.
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Also check under handle area of large muck buckets-
We have Black Widow and Brown Widow spiders who nest there.
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I went to move a jump out to use it and found grabbing the wide wing standard a bit difficult on one side, so went to the other side and came face to face with what was probably a wasps nest but it was definitely one of those stingy insects. Mare and I backed away slowly…
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Yes to checking mounting blocks! I turn over and flood mine every summer to get rid of wasp nests. Fortunately, I’ve never been stung.
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One should never say something like this…
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So true. I’m riding in about an hour and now I’m thinking of being extra careful Have not flooded the mounting block yet.
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Ok, I did not need to know this. I guess I did but . . .no. I already check the hose over-flow bucket everyday cause we have massive spiders that hide in that. Now this 
.
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Wasps also like the insides of pipe gates. I’ve been stung that way several times.
Would also like to second the checking the trailer tip. Can’t imagine anything worse than loading a horse in a trailer and having them get stung.
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Last year was the wasp summer from hell - we both got stung multiple times. At one point one or both of us had been stung mowing three times in a row. Tips from this:
- check t-post caps. One sting was from mowing the fence line and passing a nest under the cap.
- avoid yellow jackets. We ended up with a nest in the side yard (pest control guys who came to terminate were kind of surprised - apparently it was an odd place for one) that accounted for three of the sting incidents (got me one weekend once, but just thought it had been a wasp in the grass, didn’t realize it was apparently the beginnings of a nest. Got stung 5 or 6 times when I ran over the same spot two weeks later, then husband got stung trying to retrieve the lawn mower that I abandoned while running from yellow jackets. Lawn mower remained abandoned until nest was destroyed).
- always check the trailer - they were all over my trailer, inside and outside, as well as above the tack room door at the boarding barn. We also had to have two nests on the barn roof killed that were apparently guinea wasps, which are about as aggressive as yellow jackets. Which reminds me I need to take wasp spray out to the barn so I can dissuade the ones I see.
- I have also gotten stung by wasps nesting in a gate. I’ve heard you can stuff it with steel wool or duct tape the bottom of the gate to prevent this? That’s been on my to do list but haven’t gotten there yet.
Good point about moving things too - I move the water trough every time I swap pastures, and it gets dumped regularly, but since it’s just me and one ridden horse I don’t move the mounting block much.
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I got stung last year on my porch by a yellow jacket on the back of the neck. I didn’t know they had a couple small nests developing under some railing and behind a motion lite.
Best time to spray for wasps is when the sun is going down or early in the morning. They are less active then and the majority should be located in the nest.
We did have a sizeable nest in above the coupler of my gooseneck trailer. Luckily I saw them flying around before I went to hitch up and sprayed a can worth in there. Could never get the nest out but also they never came back. I always have a can in my trailer and two or three cans at the house.
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Sorry, I read this earlier and the title threw me off. I read it as flip your mounting blocks and then flip your people. Obviously my caffeine hadn’t set in yet. 
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Check your pasture sheds as well!
DH and I had a rental property for a few years, and decided to sell it when the tenants had moved on and we were moving out of state. When we were cleaning it up prior to putting it on the market, I noticed wasps flying in and out from under the deck. I called an exterminator, and she got some of it but refused to pull up a board to get at the biggest nest. That really irritated me as it was something I specifically asked about before engaging her.
DH ended up removing the board, and luckily didn’t get stung. The nest was successfully removed, and the house sold within a couple of days of going on the market.
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We use some of that spray foam in a can that you can get at Home Depot or Lowes, and that works fairly well, too. 
And yes, we get wasps in under the mounting block all the time. Yesterday there was an unidentified horse-fly-sized buzzing insect that was chasing us from the mounting block and irritating my horse. I think it was black and white striped. Bugger.
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Sorry about your experiences with the @$$holes with wings. Something that would likely work for filling in pipes and such well is a tough spray foam insulation and likely to last longer than duct tape.
I have built many sets of jump standards and quickly learned not to use boards on both faces. The gap in between makes a perfect site for nest building wasps. At least with a single panel I can check out both sides for nests and not be surprised by angry inhabitants swarming out of a concealed nest when I pick it up.
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So do rat snakes. They also like the sleeve on the hydraulic lift of a front-end loader. I confess that I screamed. I also stopped the tractor so it could fall to the ground and slither away to hunt mice.
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