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rainbowgardener
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Posts: 25279
Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2009 6:04 pm
Location: TN/GA 7b

blue winged wasp

So the guys unloading the big moving truck were the first to notice that there were large wasps all around the front lawn. They were staying low to the grass and the guys had been walking through them before they even noticed them, with no one getting stung.

Now that we've been here a little bit, we notice that they come and go. Certain times of day they are out and if the "green ball" bushes across the front are disturbed, they come out. They never hold still, but with my best attempts at observing, I am thinking they may be blue winged wasps:

https://www.insectidentification.org/ins ... inged-Wasp

If I am right, these guys are predators of Japanese beetles! (Actually parasitizers of them, like the braconid wasps are with tomato hornworm.) So they are all over the lawn, because they are finding the grubs in it, to lay their eggs in to. This is a good news/ bad news situation. It is nice to have a parasite for the JB's. But there are a lot of these wasps, which I take to mean there are a LOT of the grubs in the lawn. Predators never outnumber prey....

They are hard to get a picture of, but some time I will try!

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applestar
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Posts: 30543
Joined: Thu May 01, 2008 7:21 pm
Location: Zone 6, NJ (3/M)4/E ~ 10/M(11/B)

How cool if true! And a wonderful welcoming committee for your arrival. :D

...so you are seeing those two yellow spots then? What about the figure-8 courtship dance flights?

Species Scolia dubia - Blue-winged Wasp - BugGuide.Net
https://bugguide.net/node/view/431



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