CHAPTER XXIX 



THE FOREST SHELL-WASP 



Zethucculus hamatus Zav. 

 Fig. 133; 5-8 



How early one thing begins to support another in the 

 jungle! Even the infant, thread-like air root, new born 

 from the parent liana, sustains a spiral of fairy moss and 

 later a tiny emerald wasp's nest, fashioned from the ribbon 

 of the sporophyte. The great cool jungle reminds me of a 

 jig-saw puzzle, the pieces of which are its life, entwined 

 and ingrown, each using another for its own particular suc- 

 cess and to complete its part in the great green picture. A 

 giant liana supported by a still greater tree, thread-like off- 

 spring supported by the liana, fairy moss living upon the 

 thread roots, wound in its turn into the hoop-like walls of an 

 insect nursery. Here at least are five fragments of the great 

 puzzle we see fitted together. 



The nursery which belongs to the shell wasp of the for- 

 est reminds me of two algae-grown snails, one clinging to 

 the slender stalk, the other to its sister's tapering shell. In 

 reality, the two shells are the cells of the nest fashioned from 

 the ribbon-moss which grows upon the air-root. It is very 

 delicate material. One must look sharply in order to see 

 that it is a thing separate from the mere thread that supports 

 it. Peeling off the ribbon, the wasp winds it into little hoops, 

 one upon the other and cements it together with her own 

 personal glue. The building material, when dry, is tough 

 and quite waterproof. Some twenty hoops, half a millimeter 

 in width, complete each cell and the freshly made nest gives 

 off an emerald sheen. 



In each cell a stumpy, slightly bowed egg is laid, two 

 and a half millimeters long and a third as wide. It is yellow 



