56 
After the morning meal the female wasp sets about finding 
her prey—lamellicorn beetle grubs of the subfamily Rutelides. 
While very few or no grubs were found in the Philippines para- 
sitized in the field by Scolia, 1t is most probable that the abundant 
Adoretus and Anomala are her common victims. The former 
particularly was used for breeding this wasp. The grubs which 
Scolia prefers are probably in the last stage of their growth, 
when they are 20 mm. or‘more in length. But it is evident 
from the diminutive size of some of these wasps, especially 
of the male sex, that small grubs must sometimes be utilized. 


Fig. 22. Scolia manilae, , X 5 (after Swezey). 
fo) e 
The grubs live from one to several inches in the ground and feed 
at the roots of plants, particularly of grasses. In spite of the 
frequent hardness of the soil the Scolia wasp by some sense, 
probably situated in the antennae, succeeds in locating her 
prey and in digging down to it. ~The latter -resents “the 
iutrusion of this unwelcome visitor, but to no avail, for it 
is soon put into a comatose state, from which it never awakens, 
by one or more stings in the nerve center of the throat 
or breast. It now rests quite limply on its back, but may exhibit 
signs of life in slight movements of the mouth parts. The wasp 
presses out a sort of cell about it and resting longitudinally on 
the grub, attaches her pearly white egg so that it stands upright 
on its head end, on about the seventh ventral segment of the 
abdomen, (Fig. 23). The incubation period is from two to about 
three days. The wasp grub feeds with its mouth applied always 
to the same spot on its host, (Fig. 24+). It moults several times, 
and in the latter part of its life, breaks through the grub’s skin 
and, inserting head and thorax into its victim, soon reduces it to 
a mere shell. From five to about seven days after hatching it 
