Tom Jacob
1 nov 2021
A perfect mother caring for her larvae.
The queen wasp awakes from hibernation in the spring. After a short period of feeding and exploring, she begins to build a nest in a dark and dry place. She usually chooses a warm spot and can fly up to 70 km (40 miles) in search of the perfect nest site.
She builds a honeycomb-like cell structure out of wood fibre. The wood fibre is chewed and glued together with wasp saliva to form a sort of paper mâché material.
In each cell of the new nest, the queen then lays a single egg, which hatches into a larva in 5‒8 days. The queen gathers sugary substances and catches other insects to feed her larvae. After five moults over about 15 days each larva spins a silken cap over the cell and pupates. Pupation takes 8-18 days before an adult worker wasp emerges. In total it takes approximately 28-48 days from egg to adult wasp.