Home | Site Map | Search | Photographs of the strange nest I came across one Summer, about 2010, with its unusual-looking wasps at work

Wasps and their nest, Strawbridge Lake Park, Moorestown, New Jersey

I had mistaken these creatures for bees, but I asked Hania Berdys, who lives in the Netherlands, and she told that they are wasps and that their nest is made of a paperlike substance. Then later from New York Parker Gambino wrote that:

The wasp nest is of Dolichovespula maculata (Family Vespidae). Common names for this species include "White-faced hornet" and "Bald-faced hornet". The insects that develop within spin individual cocoons, within which they pupate, though the silk they produce is of no practical use to people.

The nest was about 5 feet above the ground, quite unprotected from human beings, and indeed the nest disappeared in the early fall. Years later and the tree is now gone as well. The close-up photographs were taken from no more than 18-inches away, but the wasps ignored me the whole while.

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