WASPS. 191 



There is another mud-dauber or mason wasp 

 which has the very bad habit of filling every key- 

 hole of the outer doors of houses near the bush. 

 An experiment was tried by a resident of Epping, 

 of boring several holes in a slab of wood, and so 

 enabling the wasp to find a home, wdiich caused 

 every satisfaction to it, and w^as decidedly better 

 for the inmates of the house. 



Some of the smaller eumenid red and black wasps 

 build smaller and less compact houses which ap- 

 pear to be, in some cases, just carelessly put to- 

 gether and easily broken. 



There is another Eumenid wasp of the genus 

 Synagris of wdiose habits we w^ill cpiote in detail, 

 for they form a link with the more strictly social 

 wasps (Family Vespidse). We quote observations 

 made by E. Roubaud in 'The Natural History of 

 the Solitary Wasps of the Genus Synagris,'' pub- 

 lished in Smithsonian Report for 1910. The ob- 

 servations were made in the Congo Region, Africa. 



"The wasp, Synagris sicheliana, lays an egg in its 

 cell of earth. Then without haste, after having 

 guarded it for some time, it commences to collect 

 a small provision of caterpillars for the moment of 

 hatching. When the larva has commenced to feed, 

 the Synagris continues the provisioning, but in a 

 slow and regular manner, taking care to furnish 

 its larva with a little more food than is necessary 

 for the day. It is a progressive provisioning from 

 day to day, wdiich gives the wasp the necessary 

 leisure to guard the larva and watch its growth." 



"The caterpillar.s lie in the earthen cell. The 



