ELEMENTARY STUDIES IN INSECT LIFE 



FIG. 54. A mud-dauber (Pelopceus cemen- 

 tarius). XI 1 -- 



mud-daubers' homes 

 pasted to the under 

 side of your porches, 

 around the barns, and 

 not infrequently un- 

 der the bridges of the 

 highway. If you will 

 break open one of 

 these nests you will 

 find, if the time is 

 right, the developing 

 form surrounded by 

 spiders in a comatose condition; or if perchance the 

 regular occupant is gone you will find the remnants 

 of these same spiders in this little adobe structure. 



The strength and prowess frequently displayed by 

 these solitary wasps in securing their prey is often re- 

 markable. They will frequently enter dark hay-mows 

 and old garrets in quest of spiders for their young. 

 The writer on one occasion observed one of these at- 

 tempt to drag a good-sized ground-spider up the side of 

 a church to a knot-hole in the weather-boards, where 

 the wasp was constructing a nest. Laboriously and yet 

 steadily did it go diagonally up the building, moving 

 backward with its mandibles fastened in its load, until 

 it reached an elevation of about three feet, when, its 

 strength giving out, the wasp, spider and all fell to the 

 ground. This operation was repeated three times be- 

 fore darkness interfered with the insect's work for that 

 day. 



When these female wasps are ready to deposit their 



