46 WASP STUDIES AFIELD 



once and continued her search six feet to the west. She 

 eventually came back and tried to dig in three or four places 

 near her original location, but the loose surface dirt always 

 rolled in upon her. She left again and wandered on foot 

 down the road; finally after ten minutes she returned on 

 the wing, found the spot without difficulty and again dug 

 in a hole which promised to be successful. A caterpillar 

 hurried by very near to her and seemed to make her uneasy, 

 so she drew her spider back three or four inches. Again 

 she departed for a while on an unexplained jaunt. Mean- 

 while we brushed the loose surface dust aside to give her 

 access to the soil which was firm enough for her to dig 

 in, and, with a knife, began a new hole. Her spider still 

 lay near by. A parasitic bee-fly, which had been hover- 

 ing about inquisitively from time to time, hovered over our 

 hole the same as over hers. The wasp came back thrice but 

 did not seem to recognize the area. 



Round and round the dusty margin the wasp searched 

 anxiously, and finally ventured to cross the area (six inches 

 in diameter) from which the dust had been removed, peeped 

 once into the hole which had formerly been hers, and scuttled 

 away frantic. During her absence we replaced some dust 

 around the hole ; still she did not recognize it nor her spider, 

 one inch distant. She came within a few inches of it on 

 several occasions, but always searched over the dusty peri- 

 phery and avoided the open area with the artificial hole 

 exactly where her own had been. We finally placed the 

 spider on the dust in the region where she searched most. 

 She returned to the familiar spot where she found it, looked 

 at it for a moment but showed no particular agitation, 

 dropped her excited manner, walked straight to the hole 

 and began digging inside it without a moment's delay, and 

 as calmly and business-like as if nothing had gone wrong! 

 After digging out a nea.t little pile of dirt she came and 



