Golden Gate Park was, atypically for August, teeming with yellowjackets this past weekend, prompting some Outside Lands festival-goers to wonder if the foot traffic had disturbed their nests, or something.

Having gone to almost all 16 editions of Outside Lands since its inception in 2008, I can say with some confidence that yellowjackets are not commonplace in Golden Gate Park in August, and certainly not in the numbers we saw this year.

Festival-goers were getting stung here and there, and buzzy wasps were swarming around food stalls and alighting on people's brightly colored clothing all weekend long, freaking a lot of people out.

"They seem upset with us," said one friend I was standing with at the festival on Saturday.

And, indeed, the wasps were especially fond of investigating people's hair, which could lead to some inadvertant swatting.

The trouble, it seems, was the unusually warm July we just had, and/or there are just a much larger number of these wasps in the region than there has been in the past. KTVU reported last August on a noted uptick in yellowjacket complaints in the North Bay, with Sonoma County officials fielding hundreds more calls than usual about mitigating underground yellowjacket nests. And the Sacramento Bee reported last month that this is just a "big year for wasps" in California in general, and the heat has driven many of the insects to seek out the cool fog, taking up residence in places like Golden Gate Park.

The Chronicle reported on the seeming infestation at Outside Lands, and noted how the terrain of the park is perfect for yellowjacket nesting — using gopher holes, debris piles, and old tree stumps for nests. And it doesn't help that yellowjackets get aggressive when their in-ground nests get disturbed. Also, the paper notes that by late summer, the wasps' diet of insects is on the wane, and they start seeking out meat and fruit for sustenance.

It's not clear if SF Rec & Parks has been doing, or will be doing, any new yellowjacket mitigation in the park.

There were not any widespread reports of bad stings, swarming insects, or festival-goers having severe allergic reactions to stings. But as Chappell Roan took the stage on Sunday and perhaps 100,000 people were in the park, there were more wasps than drones flying around, taking in the action, and landing in people's hair.

Related: Outside Lands 2024 Day Two: Sun Shines for Channel Tres, Postal Service Makes Everyone Cry