Solitary Bees and Wasps 



into the most varied channels. We have mentioned the leaf- 

 cutters and carpenters, then there are potters and masons ; 

 cuckoo-bees, so called because they resemble cuckoos in 

 habit, as nearly as an insect can resemble a bird ; blunt- 

 tongued burrowing bees and sharp-tongued bees of similar 

 habit. Of the latter there are an enormous number of 

 species in this country alone. They, or rather the females, 

 dig moderately deep holes in the soil clay is preferred 

 and at the end of the burrow an oval chamber is con- 

 structed. The walls of these chambers are always quite 

 hard, for they are well " puddled " by the females, and 

 not without reason. They are used as storehouses for the 

 honey and pollen destined to nourish the larvae, so that, 

 unless the walls were well hardened, the honey would soak 

 into the soil and be lost to the bee. Nature seems to have 

 ordained that the males of the sharp-tongued burrowing 

 bees should be lazy, for she has provided them with fore- 

 legs which are useless for digging and hind legs which are 

 unable to carry pollen. 



The solitary wasps differ from the bees of similar habit 

 in one very remarkable particular : whereas the food of 

 the bee larva in every case consists of "bee bread," that of 

 the wasp larvae always consists of insects, and each species 

 of solitary wasps stores its larder with a special kind of 

 insect. Some of these wasps are partial to spiders, which, 

 by the way, are not insects at all ; others prefer beetles, 

 others again cockroaches or locusts or cicadas, and so on, 

 each species exhibiting a partiality for a particular species 

 of insect. Of the solitary wasps none are more interesting 

 than the sand-wasps. Small wonder that Fabre, who was 

 described as the insects' Homer, made them the object of 

 special study. Though others have described their habits 

 more accurately, the French naturalist always contrived 

 to weave a beautiful romance around his beloved insects 

 and their doings. 



The sand-wasps excavate tunnels in the earth, using 

 their mouths for the work. Their jaws are remarkably 



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