Ginormous Wasps Make My Home Their Home
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I was mowing my yard today when I saw several hummingbirds start to fly all around me. I was near the edge of my home and they kept bumping into one another, barely noticing me. As I looked closer, these 1 1/2 to 2 inch birds were actually gigantic wasps!
Having an aversion to pain and over-sized insects, I carefully mowed the area around their buzzing rugby match. I later looked up the wasp on the Internet and discovered that they’re Cicada Killing Wasps
I learned that the supposed rugby match was actually male wasps defending their territory, which are areas where they dig holes into the ground. I also learned that they don’t sting — excellent news! In fact, only the female wasps sting and they generally don’t sting humans, only cicadas.
Oh, did I mention they kill and eat cicadas?
The female cicada will kill sting and paralyze the cicada, bury it into a cell and then insert an egg that will feed off of it while it’s still alive for up to 2 weeks.
Not only do these wasps only eat cicadas, they are also anti-social. Unlike most wasps that are social and work together, these wasps work alone, which explained why they were fighting over their territory against one another.
