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More Winter ‍
This spring, a female mud dauber wasp will chew her way out of the dirt chamber that’s protected her through this long, cold winter. She’s grown from egg to larvae to pupa to adult in that dirt catacomb. Soon it’ll be time for her to leave the nest and fly away with her long, thin, transparent wings. She’ll be looking to mate; it’s time to set up her own household. She chews mud like old Aunt Sally chewed her tobacco, spitting out mud strips to pack on one side, then the other, to create a series of hollow tubes a little more than half an inch wide, four or five inches long, with several chambers contained within. She’ll stop working long enough to mate. After every inch or so of mud tube construction, she’ll lay one fertile egg inside. Now, she’ll hunt spiders. She’ll sting, paralyze, and stuff living spiders—lots of spiders–inside the chamber for her offspring to feed on as they grow. When not another spider will fit in that section of chamber, she seals it closed with more spit and mud, mates again, and begins the whole process again. If she builds her masterpiece on a wood duck box on Lake Jocassee, it’ll be gone next winter with one swipe of a scrape blade. Female mud daubers are said to sing as they work. This summer, let’s listen for them. ~K