960 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HIST. SOCIETY, Vol. XXFIL 



No. XXVI— A NOTE ON THE INSECT-EATING HABITS OF THE 

 INDIAN HORNET (VESPA CI NOT A). 



I have thouglit that the following observations might prove worthy of being 

 placed on record, as, from time to time scattered notes have appeared in various 

 journals, scientific and otherwise, on wasps capturing, and often eating bees, 

 other wasps, such as species of Polistes, and even small moths. On Barkuda 

 Island in the Chilka Lake I have on two occasions seen Vespa cincta flying along 

 with a dead Polistes stigma which it carried with the front legs, and I have 

 witnessed a similar incident near Chandipore, Orissa. 



I have never seen wasps raiding the nests of bees as they are sometimes said 

 to do, but I once saw Vespa cincta capturing the solitary bee Megachile lanata 

 as it emerged from its cartridge -shaped mud nest, which it builds in the backs 

 of books, etc., on Barkuda. On another occasion while out collecting, I saw one 

 of these hornets sitting on a leaf, with its sting inserted into the thoracic region 

 of the bee Nomia oxybeloides almost exactly as shown in the illustration for 

 which I have to tharik Mr. Bagchi, the artist of the Indian Museum. I captured 

 both the wasp and the bee and have sent it for the Society's collection. 



Cases of hornets eating small moths are not very common. I have on 

 several occasions kept an Indian Hornet and a Pyralid together in a 

 breeding cage, and have asked several people who are keen observers if they have 

 seen a wasp eating a moth, with absolutely negative results. On a single 

 occasion, however, I saw this wasp capture the cosmopolitan Arctiid, Deiopea 

 pulchella, denude it of its legs, wings and head, and fly off with the body, a mode 

 of capture somewhat different from the case cited by Green. 



Tor references, etc., see Gravely, Rec. Ind. Mus., XI, pp. 493-494 (1915) 

 and for a short description of Barkuda Island, Annandale, Rec. Ind, Mus., 

 XIII, pp. 17-19 (1917). 



CEDRIC DOVER. 



Indian Museum, 

 Calcutta, December 1920. 



