The right stripes.
In the bright sunshine of incipient summer the garden bench has been commandeered by a queen wasp (not a WASP or, thankfully, the various members of W.A.S.P.). Every ten minutes she helicopters in to pick up strips of wood, chewing industriously away before carrying off her spoils to her secret base. The bench is quickly becoming stippled with the marks of her labour.
I like to think that she’s building a host of tiny wasp-sized benches, ready for her future handmaidens to populate as they train to become fully fledged yellowjackets – a kind of insectoid convent school with a particularly lively uniform.
It gave me a chance to try a few close-up photographs, and the hankering for a proper macro lens on my camera in order to do an even better job. Unfortunately macro lenses are majorly expensive so it might be a wee while…
May 12th, 2008 at 8:33 pm
Erk! While I appreciate the theoretical wonder of wasps, and the good that they do, I have real problems with the practical side of their existence.
Then again, our annual ‘find where they’ve built the nest this year’ hunt around the garden, peering at the walls of the house, may go some way towards explaining that.
May 12th, 2008 at 9:13 pm
Well, as you know, I’ve had more than my fair share of run-ins with them in the past too, the nest in my bedroom wall being the most memorable.
But she’s been quite benign so far, although I’ll be interested to see if her progeny also visit the bench for building materials. A seat covered in munching wasps is not the most inviting of buttock receptacles.
I’m reminded of Nicholas Cage’s gloriously terrible acting in the Wicker Man remake: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmp-SRMwF3E
May 12th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
Aaaaarrrgggghhhh - I so didn’t need to see that, and I only watched the first 5 seconds!
I’ve heard that chickens will eat wasps - so chicken-keeping was my plan until I spent a happy half hour watching Mama fox and her nine half-grown cubs playing in the garden the other night…
May 12th, 2008 at 10:09 pm
Well then, surely the answer is to dress the wasps up as chickens so the foxes eat them. See? Logic in action.