Subject: Glossy blue-black bug
Location: SW Virginia public garden
August 7, 2017 1:38 pm
Hi, I saw these bugs recently on a very busy patch of hoary mountain mint. They moved too fast to get a good photo of their wings – they are a beautiful blue-black. Can you tell me what they are? thank you!
Signature: curious

Great Black Wasps

Dear curious,
these look to us like Great Black Wasps, Sphex pensylvanicus.  This BugGuide image nicely illustrates the blue reflections on the wings.

Great Black Wasp

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Subject: Corfu burrowing bug
Location: Central Corfu, Greece
August 8, 2017 2:08 am
Hi
I wonder if you can help please?
Today – Aug 8th – in Corfu Greece, we’ve seen this chap burrowing in the garden of our villa. He’s about 2cm long and is Black and Tan with external wings – not folded under a shell. He’s making grumbling chirping noises a bit like a cricket. He’s excavating the hole moving small stones out.
Thanks
Signature: Helen

Sand Digger Wasp

Dear Helen,
We quickly located a matching image on the Insects and Spiders of Corfu site that identifies this wasp as a Sand Digger Wasp, and according to information posted to Jungle Dragon:  “Taken in Arillas, Corfu. I saw this sand wasp dragging the bush cricket down the path. The cricket was around 2.5″ in length (body) and this wasp was huge, dragging it as it couldn’t carry the cricket.”   Jungle Dragon goes on to identify the wasp as Polalonia, but we question that identification, since according to BugGuide, the members of the genus known as Cutworm Wasps prey on cutworms, not Bush Crickets.  This Getty Images page just calls it a Sand Wasp.  Only female Solitary Wasps build nests in which to raise a brood.

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Subject:  Grass Carrying Wasp from France
Location:  southwest France
August 1, 2017
Hi Daniel,
Continuing the theme of the grass carrying wasps, there are 3 or 4 of them nesting in the hollow section frame of our aluminium table on the terrace here in south-west France.
They are quite active at the moment and I promised you a photograph if I could get one. Herewith attached.
Sadly, I have missed two great opportunities to photograph them – once bringing in a long piece of grass for the nest and  the other a day or two ago flying in with a young cricket under its ‘fuselage’. Would have been great shots bout just couldn’t get the camera to hand in time. The do seem to be still nesting and feeding so I will do my best to capture this for you sometime and let you have the images.
Whilst writing, I have also attached an image of a spider’s web the like of which I have never seen before. It is fully round in shape (I.e. globe / ball shaped) and  abot 2 ½” – 3” diameter, with what I presume to be the owner sitting quietly in the centre awaiting the arrival of its latest prey. It is on the outside of a window, placed in the angle of the frame and the stone wall. Any ideas on what sort of arachnid this may be?
Kind regards,
Robin

Grass Carrying Wasp

Dear Robin,
Because your original submission did not include an image, we posted it as an update to our Bug of the Month for May 2017 posting on Grass Carrying Wasps, but the addition of this image warrants its own unique posting.

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Subject: Big black wasp?
Location: Toronto, ontario
July 23, 2017 10:02 am
Hi, we have seen a few of these flying around and going in between the windows. We we removed the inside screens to take a look we found lots of hay and something that looks like is was eggs and a big nest. What should we do to stop this
Signature: K & D

Grass Carrying Wasp

Dear K & D,
Your images are of a Grass Carrying Wasp and the nest of a Grass Carrying Wasp.  Grass Carrying Wasps frequently build nest, according to BugGuide “These wasps commonly make their nest in the narrow track found above outer windows.”  Grass Carrying Wasps are not aggressive, and if the nests are in a location that permits the adult wasps to escape once they emerge, we would suggest you just leave them alone.  Most of the images of Grass Carrying Wasps we have on our site are freshly made and newly provisioned with Tree Crickets.  Your nest was built last season and contains the pupae of the soon to emerge adult wasps.

Grass Carrying Wasp Nest

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