164 WASP STUDIES AFIELD 



one unfamiliar with wasps' ways would have said at a glance 

 that her interest in the spot was forever at an end. 



FIG. 38. Priononyx aftratum deftly bracing herself to hold her bal- 

 ance while pounding down the soil in her burrow with her head. Note 

 position of legs. Natural size. 



Then we went back and dug up the first hole for which 

 she had hunted so long and earnestly, expecting to find 

 what she so carefully sealed up in it. It was stark empty ! 

 Why had she been so very particular to put the dirt back 

 into all of these empty holes? 



Let us add here that this persistent habit of closing up 

 the abandoned holes is not constant. We have one record 

 of an atratum which commenced six holes before she was 

 satisfied with a location, but made no attempt to kick back 

 the earth. 



The last nest, to which our wasp had given such careful 

 attention, contained the hopper with the wasp's egg ce- 

 mented, in its usual position, on the hind leg and curved 

 around the side of the body. But the Dipterous parasite 

 mentioned above must have been too quick for the mother 

 wasp after all, for fifteen minutes after the egg was laid, 

 it and the host were already teeming with tiny Dipterous 

 larvae. There is a possibility, of course, that the hopper 

 may have been parasitized as it lay in hiding, but this chance 



