Common Wasp/ (Vespula (Paravespula) vulgaris)
Shorebirds of Ireland, Freshwater Birds of Ireland and The Birds of Ireland: A Field Guide 2nd Edition with Jim Wilson.
www.markcarmodyphotography.com
The Common Wasp can be found in many types of temperate habitats. Found usually in open habitats including urban areas, which in the Irish context means it is fairly ubiquitous and can be found almost everywhere.
Nests are mostly subterranean (8-15 cm in depth) (e.g. in rodent burrows or earth cracks). Aerial nests are always in enclosed spaces (e.g. tree hollows, attics, wall voids, dense vegetation). Aerial sites are more frequent in urban areas.
Adult wasps leaving and entering a colony often carry materials which have a nutritional or nest-building function, and sometimes a sanitation or nest-cooling function. The main materials brought into a colony are fluids, including water in the crop, and pulp and flesh carried in the mandibles.
The pulp is used as a building material for the envelopes and combs of the nest. V. vulgaris is known to use rotten wood.
The fluids, with their dissolved carbohydrates, and the flesh are used to maintain the metabolic activities of the larvae and adults, for the growth and development of the larvae, for egg maturation in the queen and to build up reserves in the newly reared sexuals. Water is used in the nest building process and as an aid to reducing colony temperature when it becomes too hot. In general, water is obtained from open sources such as ponds and streams, fluids from the nectaries of flowers, extra-floral nectaries (e.g. laurel), honeydew, ripe fruit, sap flows and mad-made sweet substances.
Prey and flesh food are usually derived from live insects and other arthropods, particularly spiders, but are also scavenged from dead arthropods and vertebrates including man-derived sources. For example prey items usually consist of flies, lepidopteran larvae, spiders etc.
Generally from early March to the end of October (essentially once the warmth of Spring arrives until the colony terminates due to the cold weather that winter brings at the end of the year). Some colonies may overwinter, dying out in early spring.
Found throughout mainland England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland. Also recorded from the Isle of Man, Isles of Scilly, the Channel Islands, Outer Hebrides, Orkneys and Shetland. Elsewhere, it occurs in Europe, North Africa, northern and central Asia from Turkey to Japan and introduced into Iceland, New Zealand and south-eastern Australia. (National Biodiversity Data Centre)
This wasp was feeding on an apple half that I put into my garden for the local Blackbirds. Fantastic looking insects.
Common Wasp/ (Vespula (Paravespula) vulgaris)
Shorebirds of Ireland, Freshwater Birds of Ireland and The Birds of Ireland: A Field Guide 2nd Edition with Jim Wilson.
www.markcarmodyphotography.com
The Common Wasp can be found in many types of temperate habitats. Found usually in open habitats including urban areas, which in the Irish context means it is fairly ubiquitous and can be found almost everywhere.
Nests are mostly subterranean (8-15 cm in depth) (e.g. in rodent burrows or earth cracks). Aerial nests are always in enclosed spaces (e.g. tree hollows, attics, wall voids, dense vegetation). Aerial sites are more frequent in urban areas.
Adult wasps leaving and entering a colony often carry materials which have a nutritional or nest-building function, and sometimes a sanitation or nest-cooling function. The main materials brought into a colony are fluids, including water in the crop, and pulp and flesh carried in the mandibles.
The pulp is used as a building material for the envelopes and combs of the nest. V. vulgaris is known to use rotten wood.
The fluids, with their dissolved carbohydrates, and the flesh are used to maintain the metabolic activities of the larvae and adults, for the growth and development of the larvae, for egg maturation in the queen and to build up reserves in the newly reared sexuals. Water is used in the nest building process and as an aid to reducing colony temperature when it becomes too hot. In general, water is obtained from open sources such as ponds and streams, fluids from the nectaries of flowers, extra-floral nectaries (e.g. laurel), honeydew, ripe fruit, sap flows and mad-made sweet substances.
Prey and flesh food are usually derived from live insects and other arthropods, particularly spiders, but are also scavenged from dead arthropods and vertebrates including man-derived sources. For example prey items usually consist of flies, lepidopteran larvae, spiders etc.
Generally from early March to the end of October (essentially once the warmth of Spring arrives until the colony terminates due to the cold weather that winter brings at the end of the year). Some colonies may overwinter, dying out in early spring.
Found throughout mainland England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland. Also recorded from the Isle of Man, Isles of Scilly, the Channel Islands, Outer Hebrides, Orkneys and Shetland. Elsewhere, it occurs in Europe, North Africa, northern and central Asia from Turkey to Japan and introduced into Iceland, New Zealand and south-eastern Australia. (National Biodiversity Data Centre)
This wasp was feeding on an apple half that I put into my garden for the local Blackbirds. Fantastic looking insects.