June 3, 2002

The Will of the Wasp

Six years ago I moved from Houston (where the humidity is sliced like thick tofu) to the Texas Hill Country. Austin, to my coastal sensibilities, is drought waiting for a rain. Any precipitation here occasions school closures, last-minute vacations, and general merriment among my fellow citizens.

A couple of years ago the American elm that dominates my front yard decided to surrender to the drought and dropped its leaves in a momentary impulse. I decided that the pavers around our elm must go (what little rain that does fall here surely needed to soak into the ground). We yanked out the pavers, and installed traditional building bricks with their eyes facing skyward. Once the openings were filled with sharp sand, both tree and we benefited from our shaded, permeable patio.

A few weeks ago I noticed that several wasps were enjoying our patio as well. Sphecid wasps (the family Sphecidae includes the mud-daubers, digger wasps, and sand wasps) often construct their tunneled nests in soft sand, and my patio bricks with their sand-filled eyes afforded the ideal setting. This past weekend I sat at my front window, watching as the wasps scurried over the bricks, rearranging each pebble (boulders to them) in their attempts to fashion the perfect tunnel.

The wasps arrived in early morning, and immediately set out to open their burrows to the outside world. The pebbles were carefully removed and placed, in an ordered pile, around the lip of the hole. Often the wasps would return with paralyzed grasshoppers, cramming the helpless creatures head-first into a tunnel. [A natural history note - Sphecids sting and paralyze their prey before placing it in the nest. A single egg is deposited on the prey within each tunnel or cell, and the tunnel is sealed with pebbles (in the case of mud-daubers, the cell is sealed with mud). The larvae that hatch from the eggs feed on the prey items left by the adult wasp.] My wasps were restless laborers, constantly scurrying about in their daily chores and disappearing for hours as they scoured the yard for prey.

In the evening the wasps would return, and go about replacing each pebble in the tunnel mouths. Each rock was inspected, assessed, and then gently rolled into place. The wasps nervously flicked their wings while in their construction site, and were quick to fly away when disturbed by intruders (usually one of my cats). Once finished, the tunnels were closed off to any nighttime predators.

I watched my wasps for hours, relishing this intimate view of their incredibly busy world. I shared my wasps with my wife, my parents, neighbors, and any passerby willing to spend a few moments looking at bugs. All were captivated by this insectivorous drama taking place underneath our invigorated American elm and respective noses.

The recreation of birding, by my definition, is to find one’s way to nature through birds. Birds offer ease of entry, and the growth in birding’s popularity is primarily due to its accessibility (particularly to an urban population). Yet what could be more accessible than wasps in your backyard, or tadpoles in a neighborhood creek, or raccoons in your garbage cans?

You must be open to nature, willing to have it embrace you. Nature is wherever you look, even in the bricks that pave your patio.

Trip du Jour, June 3, 2002
The Will of the Wasp
by Ted Eubanks

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