On the same excursion during which I encountered the
strangely attractive crab spider, a fellow walker called my attention to a wasp that was on the path.
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| A mason wasp (Eumeninae) collecting mud from the ground. |
The ground was still moist from rain in the previous days and the wasp appeared to be digging in the mud with its mandibles. Then, as I was pressing the shutter button of my camera, the wasp suddenly took flight. By chance, the wasp and the mud ball it was flying off with were caught in the picture.
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| The mason wasp flies off with the mud ball held in its mouth. |
What could a wasp do with mud? It could build the walls of a nest! I had seen similar wasps around the house which had done just that. The wasps had constructed their mud nests in crevices and had progressed to provisioning the nests with food. In the picture below, you can see a mason wasp's nest in the frame of one of our windows. Just inside the entrance to the nest, part of a green caterpillar (a.k.a. food for the wasp's offspring) is still visible.
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| The nest of another wasp, complete with a green caterpillar to feed the wasp's offspring. |
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