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SOME OBSEEVATIONS ON VESPA GERMANIC A. 



By Marion Black-Hawkins. 



On July 10th of this summer I discovered a wasps' nest 

 belonging to the species Vespa germanica in my garden, and 

 being anxious to study wasp economy at closer quarters than I 

 had hitherto had the opportunity of doing, I decided to dig the 

 nest up and transfer it, wasps and all, to my room. I prepared 

 a glass-box for its reception, lining the sides with brown paper, 

 and fixing dark green muslin over the top, except for one 

 entrance-hole or rather slit, which was about five inches long 

 and one inch wide. The front pane of glass I kept two-thirds 

 uncovered, through which I could watch the nest at work. I 

 hung the case on the wall above my writing-table, where I could 

 easily see all that was going on. On July 14th I went out at 

 2.30 a.m. with all the paraphernalia necessary for taking the 

 nest. I smoked two cartridges from my bee-smoker down the 

 hole, and then stopping it up I began to dig down from above. 

 It was in rather an awkward place on a bank, and not knowing 

 how far back the nest lay from the entrance-hole, I was working 

 somewhat at random, but after an hour's work I located the spot, 

 which was about ten inches below the surface. By this time a 

 good number of the wasps had begun to recover, and were 

 crawling out, still too dazed to fly of! quickly. I killed them as 

 they appeared, supposing there would be plenty more in the 

 nest when I got it out. It proved, however, to be a very small 

 affair — four small combs, the third, which was the biggest, 

 being five inches in diameter and fifteen inches in circumference. 

 Moreover, there were only about a hundred wasps hatched out ; 

 of these about fifteen escaped, I captured thirty, and the rest 

 were killed by the smoke or crushed in the digging. Most 

 unfortunately the queen also was killed. All the combs were, 

 however, full of eggs, larvae, and pupae ; in some of the cells 

 Zool. 4th ser, vol. XV., December, 1911. 2 N 



