Wasps

You might find what I’m about to say surprising, even shocking.

Wasps don’t deserve all the bad press.

Like most people I have long held a rather uncharitable view of wasps. However, a number of experiences over the years has convinced me that there are almost as many untrue myths out there about wasps as there are about honeybees.

When I first showed my next door neighbor my bees up close, she exclaimed “Oh they look like wasps!” That was a surprising thing for me to hear, having been around honeybees my entire life. I didn’t think they looked much like wasps at all. However, if you thought of bees as the big fat bumblebees, then I guess I could see how you might think a honeybee and a wasp look familiar.

Many people (including most beekeepers) will tell you that honeybees are not aggressive and generally sting only as a last resort. This is generally true. However, they will also in nearly the same breath tell you that wasps are quite aggressive, as though they will sting with the least or no provocation. I have been trying in vain to prove this true for many years. 25 years of experience has led me to conclude this is a blatant and slanderous untruth, which has unfairly maligned the reputation of wasps.

On the farm, particularly in August as the honey flow dried up, there were thousands of wasps and hornets around the honey house. They were attracted to the smell of honey and congregated by the hundreds around anything out in the open that had any stickiness to it. On my occasions, I would stand there making a firm impression with my thumb on the back of the wasps. They invariably found it a difficult burden to bear. You would think that an aggressive species, prone to attack, would have responded in force to this. After all, this would be self defense, completely justifiable in human terms. But no, I don’t think I was EVER stung by a wasp on those occasions despite having dispatched thousands of them. What I did observe is that wasps, and hornets even more, are extremely wary when foraging. Of course, this makes a great deal of evolutionary sense when you’re so far down the food chain.

Over the years, other experience observing wasps in action has reinforced my view that foraging wasps are not aggressive in the least, and to the contrary, are quite cautious. Take for instance the late summer picnic. Within a short period of time, the uninvited wasps show up. I’ve watched countless times as someone waved there arms to shoo away the wasps, as someone else said “Don’t do that, you’ll make it mad”. Frankly, I very much doubt that wasps feel anger or other emotions as we do, but in any case, I have yet to witness a wasp getting mad and stinging the person. The wasp rarely goes away however, it just avoids the flailing arms and looks for an opportunity to get at the food. My reaction is generally to ignore the wasps, not because I’m concerned about making them mad, but because I’ve observed that they’re very hard to catch and trying to do so interrupts my meal. I have on many occasions tried to impress upon the wasps (again with my thumb), that my dinner plate is not an appropriate landing pad. But they rarely spend more than a second in any spot. I have also tried the standing two-handed swat, similar to how one would swat a mosquito, but they’re awfully hard to catch unless you have the assistance of a screened barrier. Again, despite doing this hundreds of times over many years, I don’t think I have EVER been stung doing this.

So if wasps are not aggressive how did they get the tremendously bad rep? First, I have been stung many times when inadvertently sharing a drink with a wasp. But hey, if you were inside a can or a bottle that was being tipped up, the liquid rushing toward you in a massive tidal wave, I think you might resort to a sting to make your escape too. I assume that given the number of times it has happened to me, that others have had similar experiences. Second, wasps don’t have barbed stingers like honeybees and can actually sting repeatedly although I haven’t observed this to be usual practice. Third, the other times I have been stung by wasps was when I have been near wasp nests (like within a meter). On those occasions, I’ve received multiple stings so I would say that they can be quite defensive near their nest (much more than honeybees). Wasps often choose nest locations near humans so I think my experience is similar to other peoples’. Finally, as with bees, I have witnessed a great deal of ignorance about wasps and when it comes to stinging insects, most people haven’t had the same opportunities to study them as I have, nor the patience or courage.

A couple of years ago I read an article about the benefits of wasps (see for example this Mother Earth News story and this one from a University of Arizona extension newsletter). The author pointed out what a valuable role they play in nature as cleaner-uppers (i.e. carrion feeders). I’d never thought of that before, but I found a new respect for wasps and haven’t been so quick to be an executioner since then. I know carrion feeders don’t get the good press that other similar creatures do (think vulture v. eagle, coyote v. wolf, rat v. squirrel), but they do have an important job. So next time you see a wasp, have some sympathy for the little black and yellow devil.