Sunday, July 27, 2025

Yellowjackets

 The Wise Woman and I were walking through the park when the enormous dog disturbed an underground nest of southern yellowjackets, Vespula squamosa.

I was on the other end of the leash and saw the swarm rise. I’d been stung by yellowjackets before but had never seen a swarm rise. The density of insects coming out of an inch-wide hole in the ground is hard to describe.

Researchers at Texas A&M University say nests can contain 4,000 workers.

The Wise Woman escaped, and my efforts to get the yellowjackets off the dog were mostly successful. He came out better than I did. I think I was stung 18 times. I’m taking it easy for a day or two.

at

2 comments:

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)

Hints on curtain calls

 Edward Hoagland, the writer and naturalist, died at 93. At 76, he wrote about death and how he imagined he’d go about dying. The gist of it...

  • When Willa Cather's life began
     Willa Cather had a maxim: “Life began for me when I ceased to admire and began to remember.” She liked what the Greeks called  anamnesis , ...
  • The things you hear
      Some days you go into the woods and see all kinds of things. Some days you don’t. And then there are days when you don’t see but   hear . ...
  • Alice Oswald's poem on battle
     An appropriate read for Memorial Day? How about Alice Oswald’s long poem  Memorial , which recounts how soldiers in the  Iliad  met their e...