07/04/2019
-
07/05/19
Almost one year ago (7/29/18) I shot some video and pictures of
trafific around a hole in the siding of a building at Brazos
Bend
State Park. Specifically, there were 3 species
of wasps using that same opening for about the same thing--nesting and
reproduction. This
year, on July 4th and 5th, I was at Scobee Field, and I watched a
similar situation. Various species of wasps
were using a gap in the
siding of a building to shelter their nests. This time, there
was even more going on. FOUR species of wasps, an ant, and
even
tree frogs were there! The species are:
black and yellow mud dauber (Sceliphron caemantarium)
blue mud dauber (Chalybion californicum)
cuckoo wasp (possibly Chrysis angolensis according to @RTC_Ento)
red paper wasp (Polistes carolina)
twig ant (possibly pseudomyrmex gracilis) (brief appearance)
squirrel tree frog (hyla squirella)
I
stayed around the area for a few hours and shot video (and a few
photos) whenever a wasp appeared. I left when the activity
slowed
down. But, I came back the next day and filmed a bit more, but this
time
I was at the other side of the building, under a different piece
of siding. One both sides, I watched a number of interesting
behaviours between the species. There was the same implied bad behavior
as
before--The black and yellow seemed to be only carrying nest
material (mud). The blue often appeared while carrying a
spider.
There was the occasional appearance of a cuckoo wasp, and I saw
one
leaving the "nesting area". The blue may, or may not, have
been stealing the nest cells of the black and yellow. The
cuckoo
wasp was probably sneaking in and "infecting" the nest cells of either
mud dauber by
placing its own eggs in the their brood cells to
feed on eggs or larva. But *now*, there were also the red
wasps.
And they all seemed to be sharing the same opening in the siding
without a problem--until the
red wasps started chasing the others away.
That is, away from the nests that they also had in there. The
red wasps were basically acting like jerks. The
images are frame grabs from the video I put
together.
Note that
the tree frogs seem to be just hiding from daylight as well as they
could while the wasps moved around them. The video is
here.
It's a different view of one some of our neighbors.
07/29/2018 I
was at the 40 Acre Lake bathrooms when I noticed wasp traffic near one
of the electrical outlets near the water fountain. I decided to watch
for a while and see what I
could capture with video.
I captured,
in the video clips, 3 species of wasps using the same
entrance. First, the black and yellow mud dauber (Sceliphron
caemantarium) often builds exposed nests on
many types of surfaces. However, these seem to be
building nests inside the wall
of this building. I think that the hot summer has caused the wasps to
do this. These wasps make clusters
of cylindrical cells. They use mud as building material. Once
one
cell is completed
the wasp looks for prey, which is usually some
species of spider. Different wasps have been observed
showing a
preference for different species of spider--but this could be due to
what's available nearby. The wasp
lays a single egg onto one of the
first spiders put into the cell, fills the
cell with more paralyzed
spiders (which can be around 25 spiders!), then seals the
top.
The egg hatches in 1-4 days, and all the spiders are
consumed in 1-3
weeks. If the nest was provisioned
in August, then the larva makes a
cocoon and the pupa forms during the next spring. The adult
emerges in May or June, and lives for 3 to 6 weeks. The video
clips
show wasps coming in with
dollops of mud, and some of these
are visible stuck haphazardly around the outside of the opening. I
didn't see any wasps fly in carrying prey. The image below left is a
frame from the
video
and
shows a black-and-yellow mud dauber.
Next,
I saw blue mud daubers (Chalybion californicum) entering the hole.
Information I first found online indicated that these wasps often use
"abandoned" cells of the first wasp (black and yellow mud
dauber). They provision the cells in a similar manner, but prefer black
widow and brown widow spiders. A number of online sources indicate that
blue mud daubers are a good control for populations
of widow
spiders (Latrodectus sp.). I wasn't sure why the
blue mud
daubers are showing up here, since it looks like the black and yellow
mud daubers seemed to still be building their cells. Unless,
perhaps, there are older cells in there as well. The image above center is a
frame from the
video and shows a blue mud dauber.
BUT....that didn't make sense
to me, so further research online indicated that the blue mud
daubers steal
the cells of the black-and-yellow-as described here: "since it has only recently
come to light-
that Chalybion cyaneum is
not a nest builder, but is a house breaker who with drops of water,
tears open the seal, empties the spiders belonging
to caementarium, refills it with her own prey, lays
an
egg and
then re-seals the
cell."
(source: The Spider Prey of the Mud Wasp, Sceliphron caementarium
((Araneae, Hymen.: Sphegidae)) By Phil Rau, Kirkwood. Missouri. p. 268
of ENTOMOLOGICAL
NEWS VOLUME XLVI, 1935) While the quote references
"Chalybion cyaneum" searching online seems to show that it may be the
same as Chalybion californicum...so I'm going with that
description
of
their thievery. Finally, a Cuckoo Wasp (Chrysis. spp.) made a
brief appearance at the entrance. The image above right is a frame from
the video showing the cuckoo
wasp. I did not notice where it
came from (if it had come from inside
or not), and it didn't enter while I filmed it. If it *had* been
inside, then some of those mud daubers may experience an unfortunate
surprise. Cuckoo Wasps are
named so because they parasitize mud dauber
wasps. They do this be sneaking in and placing an egg inside a
provisioned nest cell. They are just one of many species of wasps
that parasitize mud
daubers. Depending on the species of parasite
an egg is placed inside the nest cell of the host
wasp.
The larva may then hatch, eat the provisions *and* eat the host larva;
or it could wait until the host
larva has eaten the
provisions--and just eat the host larva. In any
case, it doesn't go well for the host wasp, the black and yellow Sceliphron caemantarium.
And, what at first seemed to be a convention
of wasps, or a wasp party may
have actually been something much more sinister.
11/06/2016 If
you've been walking outside among trees, you may have sometimes noticed
an ant crawling on your arm or upper body. This has occasionally
happened to me. I wondered
how the ant
managed to crawl all the
way up from the ground until I realized that the ants were falling on
to me out of the trees. I'd never considered what kind of ants they
were until recently. I'd
describe the ants as
reddish-brown and black, but long and thin
when compared with fire ants or carpenter ants. In various literature
they are described as "wasp like". They are
called Mexican Twig
Ants, Elongate Twig Ants,
or Graceful Twig Ants (pseudomyrmex gracilis
or pseudomyrmex mexicalus). I found an article online:
Elongate
Twig Ant, Mexican Twig Ant (suggested common names), Pseudomyrmex
gracilis (Fabricius) (Insecta: Hymenoptera: Formicidae:
Pseudomyrmecinae) by Patricia
L. Toth
(link: https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/pdffiles/IN/IN75200.pdf)
According
to this article, these Twig Ants have a painful sting (I've also
learned this through personal experience), but are usually only
encountered in small numbers. It is a solitary ant--it
forms small
colonies.
It feeds on live insects, fungus spores, and can tend aphids
for honeydew. These ants are originally from Mexico. As the name
suggests, Twig Ants nest in hollow twigs, but can use other small
cavities as
well. Once I learned about this ant, I started trying to
photograph one. I've tried
several times (they move quickly), and
was finally able to capture video of a twig ant on one of the benches
at BBSP. I filmed
the video at 120 fps to slow the ant's
movements. The
"wasp-like" shape of the ant can be seen, as well as
the long, oval eyes. Near the end of the video it's possible to see the
ant cleaning its antennae.
I also took a few photos, shown below. The video
clip is linked here.
I
read another article on the feeding habits of these ants:
THE
FEEDING HABITS OF PSEUDOMYRMINE AND OTHER ANTS.
W.
M. WHEELER ANDI. W. BAILEY.
link:
https://www.jstor.org/stable/1005485
In
that study, they determined that it was possible to get an idea of what
ants eat by looking at their pellets. What pellets?
Ants
clean themselves, other ants and their nest. They also can only ingest
liquids, but get those liquids by processing various prey items, such
as insects. When ants clean themselves, they use
their tongue. Ants have a tongue that they can extend between their
mandibles
for a short distance. I found this for a very
detailed study on the function of an ant's tongue:
How
Do Ants Stick Out Their Tongues?
by
J�rgen Paul, Flavio Roces, and Bert H�lldobler
link:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/11170720
According
to that study, the tongue is apparently extended "passively" by various
elastic structures that are loaded when the tongue is retracted. The
tongue is held in place by other
passive structures
that allow the
tongue to extend when those structures are moved out of the way. This
means that the tongue is not extended by pressure from the ant's body
fluid, or
hemolymph. Hard materials, and
various "gunk" that
ants clean off their antennae, etc. are deposited in a cavity
that opens just below their esophagus. This is called an
"infra
buccal pocket", and as
material gets compacted into the
pocket; it
is eventually expelled as a pellet. This pellet can be examined to
determine the nature of the materials within--and some idea of what the
ant eats can
be found. This surprised me, since owl
pellets
(which are formed a bit differently) can be used to determine what an
owl has eaten! So, at the end of my video clip, the ant
cleans
its antennae, and I
believe I can see the ant's tongue also!
The ant is pulling its antennae though comb-like structures on
its front legs called "strigils". After it combs the dirt off its
antennae, the ant uses its tongue to clean
off the strigils. This material is stored
in the infra buccal cavity. Eventually it will expelled as a very, very
small pellet.
10/16/2016
For a brief time,
there was a rather unique opportunity at the Nature Center. Yellowjackets had built a
nest on the edge of the building, right in front of the main entrance. The entrance
to the
nest was only about 7 feet high. The yellowjackets were quite
docile, fortunately-especially considering the number of people walking by just
below their nest. I didn't get a chance to look
closely at them
until about 3pm, and the sun had already moved to a point that
caused most of the area to be shaded. I took a few pictures and then a few video clips.
When I tried to take some closer shots, I realized
that I was
moving a camera (with an occasional flash) just a few feet from the
entrance of
the nest ...so I stopped taking pictures. I decided not to press my
luck. Like some other "social" hymenopterans,
if one of the workers is goaded into a defensive sting--then along with the sting
two sets of pheromones (scent markers) can be released.
One is an "alarm" scent, which alerts other
workers and brings
them out into defensive mode. The other is a "marker", which points the
alerted workers towards a TARGET to attack. This is mentioned in a study I read some time
ago:
"Developing a paired-target apparatus for quantitative testing of nest defense
behavior by vespine wasps in response to con- or heterospecific nest defense pheromones", by Sean
McCann, Onour Moeri,
Sebastian Ibarra Jimenez, Catherine Scott, Gerhard
Gries (link: http://jhr.pensoft.net/lib/ajax_srv/generate_pdf.php?document_id=6585&readonly_preview=1)
So, I
was only able to get a few interesting
macro photos, and video clips, and so I've put them together
into a short video. The images shown here are the few good ones I
captured. The video that I put together
from the clips is right
here.
I
wanted to identify these yellowjackets. My insect books didn't really
have a clear description that I could use, so I looked online, and
found some good studies. The one that helped most is:
"The
Yellowjackets of America North of Mexico" from the Department of
Agriculture (1980). Link: https://naldc.nal.usda.gov/download/CAT82762500/PDF
The
information that follows came from that source.
The
term "Yellowjacket" probably originated in America. It actually refers
to just two genera. "True Hornets" are related to yellowjackets, but
are larger, and usually live in the Old World, although one species
(The European
Hornet, Vespa crabro) has been introduced into
eastern North America around 1850. This guide had a very good
identification key, and I was able to identify the yellowjackets as
Southern Yellowjackets (Vespula
squamosa) by the line in the center
of the second abdominal segment that joins two dark bands.
Near the end of a season, workers start pulling larvae from
the
combs an feed them to other larvae, or discard them. During
this time
(late summer or autumn) workers of some types of yellowjackets are
more likely to sting, even if they are away from the nest.
Yellowjackets don't store honey. They feed their larvae meat (usually
pulped arthropods-
-the correct term is "malaxated") and possibly nectar and
honeydew. The adults can feed on juices produced while they chew and
pulp (malaxate) meat for use in the nest. They can also eat nectar and
larval secretions.
This
species of yellow jacket sometimes "usurp" colonies of another species
of yellow jacket ( such as v. maculifrons, Eastern Yellowjacket). V.
squamosa is considered a "facultative social parasite" of other species
of Vespula.
That is, they "can" parasitize other nests but it
isn't a requirement for their survival. V. squamosa *can* build their
own nests. Otherwise, a V. squamosa queen "usurps" the nest of the
original "host" queen. Then she assumes
complete control of the
host colony. The host workers then take care of the first brood of the
new queen (v. squamosa) and eventually only the new queen's workers
inhabit the colony. About 20 percent of colonies in one study
showed no
traces of the original colony--but in the rest, host workers have
remained, or the nest shows evidence of the earlier construction by the
host species. The usurped host nest can show "smaller, tan cells" that
contrast
with the large grey cells of the original owners.
So it's sometimes possible to determine the history of a v. Squamosa
colony by looking at the construction of the nest. Considering that
this nest appeared rather suddenly in this
high-traffic area, it's
probably not a "usurped" nest. There
may be some out there who feel that yellowjackets are just a nuisance
and should be eliminated, but many sources consider them beneficial
insects because of the
number of potentially destructive insects (such
as caterpillars, grasshoppers) that they abduct, malaxate, and feed
to their larvae. It is true that if large amounts of food are left
exposed to rot (quantities of protein like meat, or
sugars
like fruit),
then large numbers of yellowjackets can appear to take advantage of the
windfall. But, it's usually *people* who leave those piles of food.
Note:
8/1/2020 While watching the video during remastering, I
noticed
again that many of the yellowjackets were fanning the nest.
While
I thought at first that this was for cooling, or for ventilation--I
wonder now if they are fanning the newly-deposited wood pulp being used
as nest material. Would
this be a way to "cure" it, or dry it out
so it solifies quickly? I'll try to find out.
June
16 and June 27,
2010.
I'm going to tell you a true story about a young mother. She needed to
feed her babies, but didn't have resources at hand to feed them. So,
she
went out cruising. She went here. She went there.
Around her, there were
the sounds of unattached lovers calling for each other. She decided to
approach one of these callers; perhaps to help her with her problem. So
she picked one, got close, and suddenly stabbed it. She
immobilized the
young lover and she brought it back to her home and to her offspring.
By
then, she'd gone beyond acceptable human behavior. But her actions then
went from apparently violent to openly horrific. She dragged the
lover
into a dark room...
...and
left one of her offspring with it...
...and
then, she locked the room.
She
left her young one to eat the immobilized
lover--while the lover
still alive--or else the baby would starve to death.
I'm
speaking, of course, about a Cicada Killer Wasp. Of course
they
don't follow acceptable human behavior. They aren't human. The females
dig tunnels and and then chambers in loose sand or dirt. Then they
patrol,
looking for
Cicadas--which are buzzing out their mating calls. I have read
that the wasps will sometimes attack standing Cicadas, or take them as
they fly. Then they sting a Cicada, which paralyzes it, and carry it
back
to burrows that the wasps
have dug. There, they will place the paralyzed
Cicada in a chamber, place an egg on it, and then wall off the chamber.
The egg hatches, and the hatched larva eats the Cicada--which has been
kept "fresh" because it's paralyzed
and still alive.
I've also found another study of Cicada Killers that can be downloaded
in .pdf format. This is the link: Life
History and Habits of the Cicada Killer in Ohio .
Some
of y'all might remember that I posted some slow-motion video clips of
these
amazing insects flying around last year. That material can be seen on
this
page below. This year, they hatched in the same garden, and this time
I
decided to try to catch some as they flew back to their burrows with
prey
for their young. It's not easy, since they return from any direction
and
are really fast--they just appear and hit the burrow. I got two clips,
one just usable, and one
pretty good. Today's RICKUBISCAM is a cropped
frame capture from the newer video clip. The links appear below the
images.
--------------------------
A QUICK DROP IN
HOVERING
AROUND A BIT
Cicada
Killer with Cicada clip one (wmv. 4.8 mb)
Cicada
Killer with Cicada clip two (wmv. 10 mb)
We've
gotten quite a bit of rain in the weeks after I shot the video clips,
and
I haven't seen any more Cicada Killer activity at the cistern (where
I've
been filming these) for a while.
05/31/2009-06/21/2009-
In a garden near the Visitor Center at BBSP, there is a large,
dirt-filled,
brick cistern in the ground. Sometime around the end of May this year,
a group of large yellow and black wasps began to fly around
the garden
and in and out of the cistern. They were Cicada Killer wasps, and most
of the wasps patrolling around the garden were males. The
males hatch
a bit earlier (up to 2 weeks earlier) than the females, so they pick
perching
spots and then leave those spots for short flying patrols. They look
for
females, and also will fly after each other. It can be pretty busy, and
we had a number of park visitors coming in alarmed about the "wasps'
nest"
in the garden. What
a great intrepretive opportunity--expecially since
the wasps posed almost no threat at all. The males have a sharp
protrustion
at the end of their abdomen. This is NOT a stinger, but just a false
one.
Only the females can sting, and they
usually sting Cicadas to paralyze
them so they can be carried back to the burrows. A female can be pushed
until it stings, but they are not aggressive. Besides lacking
this
false stinger ( the females' operative one retracts), females
can be identified
by large "spurs" or paddles on their rear legs.
Since
all this activity was going on, and the males would repetitively land,
fly, and land again, I was able to take some interesting
pictures
of these large wasps. I
approached one of the males as it perched
on a post. When it took off to chase another male, I put my
hand
on the post, and it perched on my hand. Today's RICKUBISCAM shot is a
picture
of the wasp on the post. Note:
Most of the
information I got about these wasps came from a web page (my insect
guides
didn't have much). That very excellent online source is: Prof.
Chuck Holliday's Cicada Killer Page. If you really
want to learn
about these wasps, visit his pages.
---
MALE
CICADA KILLER WITH QUARTER
MALE CICADA KILLER WITH QUARTER
CICADA KILLER PERCHED ON MY HAND
-
ON
MY HAND FROM VIDEO CLIP
Cicada
Killer on my hand (slomo at end) mp4
----
ON
MY HAND CLOSER --
--
--
CLOSER CROP
ON THE POST FROM ANOTHER
ANGLE
OLD RICKUBISCAM SHOT
Directly
below are some pictures I shot in 2003, showing a dead female Cicada
killer.
A co-worker brought it in to ask if I could identify it. These 3
pictures
show the broad spurs (or paddles) that the female Cicada Killer has on
her last
pair of legs. It is supposed that they help her
dig.
The female will dig a burrow, then dig branching burrows. She will then
fly off and return with a Cicada for the burrows. She will lay a single
egg on a paralyzed Cicada. The egg will hatch
and the larva will feed on
the Cicada (kept "fresh" because it's still alive and not dead and
rotting)
until it cocoon . It overwinters in this form,and then pupates and then
hatches in the spring. The adults don't eat meat (preferring
sweet
plant juices), and don't live long (2 weeks for males, and 4 weeks for
females).
--
PRETTY BIG WASP!----
--
THE SPURS ARE
VISIBLE
ONE OF THE SPURS ON A REAR LEG
Finally,
the 3 images below are frame grabs from some short video clips put
together
from footage of the wasps flying. I tried to catch females returning
with
Cicadas, but there were at least 3 burrows in the cistern, and I
couldn't
be sure
where an incoming wasp would land. When a female did return,
she was landed and inside before I could bring the camera on her. I
couldn't
catch any of the midair collisions between males either. Remember, even
though these wasps
seem to be in a group--they are not acting cooperatively.
They all are attracted to a preferred nesting site (and may have
hatched
there).
In
my
videos, the subjects might move a bit out of frame, and a bit
out
of focus for two reasons. Even though capture was at 210 and 420 fps;
and
playback at 30 fps (about 1/7th or 1/14th that of realtime)--I shot in
realtime. Those wasps
are fast, and I had to try to keep them in frame
as they flew. Slowed down, it looks like it might be easy.
HA! Also,
once I'm shooting at that speed, focus is locked. If something moves to
far in or out of my focus depth, then it blurs. Enough
excuses. I can watch
these over and over again. The wasps look beautiful at this speed. Very
mechanical, too.
----------
Cicada
Killer at 210 fps wmv 7.6mb
Cicada
Killers at 420 fps pt1 wmv 19.8mb
Cicada
Killers at 420 fps pt2 wmv 9.0mb
12/07/2008- I
had gotten a camera that could capture high framerate video, and I was
shooting video of all kinds of things. I found some honeybees
foraging in a trash can, and I shot a couple video clips. I
was still experimenting, so I shot
one
video at 210 fps and one video
at 420 fps. I was surprised by the lack of "grace" shown by
the
bees as they flew. At times it looked like they were
dangling at random on a string.
-
honeybees
210fps wmv 2.6mb
honeybees
420 wmv 2.8mb
10/11/2006
(8/14/06; 8/10/06; 8/14/05)--I was
talking
to some Visitors to BBSP last Sunday. It turned out that they had
recently
moved from Colorado, and I had the opportunity to point out some of our
local arthropods. As I did, I realized that I
hadn't shown one of our more
brightly-colored insects. It also has a nickname that might alarm some.
So, here it is. I filmed some of this material in August of 2006, and
some
in August of 2005. This could indicate that they are more active
at
this
time, but perhaps not. -
At first
glance, the insect in this image -
looks like an ant--a large, hairy ant. But actually, this insect is a
wingless,
solitary wasp. It's sometimes called a Red Velvet Ant (dasymutilla
occidentalis).
It is also known as a "Cowkiller". The first image below (ONE) shows
the
insect near a quarter. The next two clips show
other views of the ant (TWO,
THREE) inside a petri dish. I wasn't going to let it sting ME. The last
two images below
(FOUR, FIVE) are frames from short video clips. These
images were shot inside, and the artificial lighting gives a "darker"
cast
to the red colors, and shows a slight iridescent sheen on the wasp.
These
were taken in 2005. There are two links
below images FOUR and FIVE to the
clips.
--------
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
COWKILLER
IN DISH PT.
1 1.08MB COWKILLER
IN DISH PT. 2 1.5MB
According
to A Field Guide to Common Texas Insects by Drees and Jackman (C) 1998
(pp. 282-283) This wingless form is the female. The males are marked
differently,
have wings, and don't sting (this is usually the case, since the stinger
on many insects is a modified form of the ovipositor-a hollow structure
used for laying eggs by many insects. Some use the ovipositor to drill
into wood, or dirt, or other insects before laying eggs. This means
that
only females would have the
ovipositor, and therefore, a stinger.) The
females dig to the nesting chambers of ground-nesting bees. They eat a
hole through the cocoon where they deposit an egg on the host larva.
After
hatching, the Cowkiller grub eats the host larva
before finally developing
into an adult. The female ant fights ferociously and has a painful
sting.
The name "Cowkiller" refers to the fact that this sting is very
painful.
So painful that it was said to be able to kill a cow. This is only
figurative.
This
year, I found a Cowkiller wandering through the grass while I was
exercising
at Memorial Park. Today's RICKUBISCAM is one of the few usable images I
could get at that time. When this wasp breaks cover, or is disturbed,
it
can run
VERY fast, and is hard to capture. A few days later, I found
another one working in the loose dirt under the Observation Tower at
40-Acre
Lake. Compared to the bright sunlight outside, it was a bit
difficult
to see in the shade under the deck.
I shot some video anyway.
The images below are frames from the video clips. The first clip (image
SIX, below) shows the dasymutilla apparently
foraging, and then
burrowing. Since it is under cover, and I haven't disturbed it, the
Cowkiller
is moving relatively slowly. The next clip (image SEVEN, EIGHT, below)
shows some more movement. Look at image EIGHT and you'll see a red
circle.
This shows an Antlion pit. In the second clip, it appears that the
Antlion
is either
excavating its pit after the Cowkiller has collapsed it, or else
it is trying to trap the Cowkiller (which seems quite optomistic to ME).
I noticed
a number of other wasps digging in the area, and they appeared to be
making
nests. It may be
possible that this dasymutilla occidentalis was
looking for some of these finished nests to use.
----
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
COWKILLER
BURROWING 6.2MB
COWKILLER
PASSES ANTLION 4.6MB
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