THE SAND-LOVING AMMOPHILA 215 



and laid it back on her rubbish-heap, where an annoying bit 

 of stick and a troublesome cinder had already been placed. 

 Later on, when she was ready for her hammer, she went 

 directly and, to our great delight, got our pebble which she 

 had so stolidly spurned only a few minutes before. If, in 

 grinding up the clods for filling, one does not readily go to 

 pieces, she does not leave it in the hole for filling but takes 

 it out and throws it away. 



Thus she finishes her task with characteristic precision, 

 and leaves it beautifully done. In accomplishing the clos- 

 ing, she devotes about forty minutes of careful attention 

 to a task which wasps of many other species finish in a few 

 minutes. 



Here we have not only the record of a tool-using habit of 

 an insect, but also, what is equally rare and valuable, a possi- 

 ble clue to the probable origin of this habit or instinct. We 

 see her using first the loose earth, then clods with which to 

 pack the earth tighter and more tight, and finally using 

 some object one degree harder which will pack down the re- 

 maining dust on top of the hole, but will not go to pieces 

 and leave more litter of its own on the site. 



This is not the first record of the tool-using behavior of 

 Ammophila. The Peckhams have observed one instance in 

 A. urnaria, and Williston 1 records the same for A. yarrowi, 

 while Hungerford and Williams 2 found an Ammophila sp. 

 that used an Acridiid leg for a tool in pounding down 

 the soil. Hartman 3 finds that with A. procera, at the end of 

 the operation of closing the nest, it sometimes happens 

 "that a piece of wood is pressed down tightly, then pulled 

 out and pressed down again, and this repeated several times, 



iEnt. News 3: 85. 1892. 



2 Ent. News 23 : 244-246. 



3 Bull. Univ. Tex. 66: 17. 1905. 



