Family Life — Social Communities 331 



spittle of the insects. Each nest contains a number 

 of ovoid cells within which the grubs grow and feed. 



All these insects show great care for their young, 

 storing up food for their sustenance, and building 

 nests for their protection. In most cases the food is 

 stored, the egg laid and the cell sealed up, the mother 

 never watching the growth of her offspring. But the 

 digging-wasp Bembex leaves the cells open, and brings 

 fresh supplies of flies to her grubs every day. Here 

 then we have a family life comparable to that of birds. 

 It often happens that a number of the "solitary" 

 wasps or bees whose habits we have been considering 

 form their nests close together, making an imperfect 

 colony, or that a number of them pass the winter in 

 company in some sheltered spot. But it is not 

 apparently thus that the true social communities have 

 been elaborated ; these, like human states, have their 

 origin in the family. For these communities three 

 conditions are necessary — a nest large enough for a 

 number of insects, a close grouping of the cells, and 

 an association between mother and offspring in the 

 perfect state. The last condition will be brought 

 about by the emergence of the older insects of the 

 brood while the mother is still occupied with the 

 younger larva or their cells. In a single species of 

 solitary bee (Halictiis quadristrigatus) these conditions 

 are almost fulfilled, but the first young insects to 

 appear are males, and when the females are developed 

 the mother dies (ipS)* 



Social Communities. — For the formation of a 

 true community the mother must co-operate with her 

 female offspring. A mother or queen among the 

 Social Wasps (Vespids), after wintering, starts a fresh 

 colony in the early spring. She builds her nest of paper 

 which she makes from vegetable substances worked 

 up with her mandibles, and moistened with her spittle. 



