Backyard and Beyond

Starting out from Brooklyn, an amateur naturalist explores our world.

As John Burroughs said, “The place to observe nature is where you are.”

Trypoxylon politum

July 24
July 30: another tube has been added.
And while we watched, one of the wasps, pretty elusive in my experience, started yet another.
August 6: New tube complete, and yet another being started at the corner on the right.
Here’s another from July 24.
And July 30, with one addition.

If you look under eaves, bridges, tunnels, and, in Green-Wood, around the nooks and crannies of mausoleums, you might very well find some of these mud tubes. After all this construction work, the female Organ-pipe Mud-dauber hunts for spiders, which she paralyzes and stuffs into chambers within each tube. Each chamber gets an egg.

The old nests can look rather messy. They may also be recycled by another species of mud-dauber, the Common Blue Mud-dauber Wasp (Chalybion californicum). Note the patch:

Got mud-daubers? There is nothing to fear from them. By the way, did mud-using wasps inspire humans to make bricks or pots from mud and clay?

Thank you, readers, subscribers, and supporters!

mthew

4 responses to “Trypoxylon politum”

  1. Sherry Felix

    So cool. amazing creatures.

    Reply
  2. Chuck McAlexander

    Can we train these wasps to develop an appetite for Spotted Lantern Fly? Maybe do a little gmo work on them so their offspring like the flavor or the adults go into a fit of rage when they see the destructive invaders?

    Reply
  3. Evva K.

    I absolutely love these posts!!! There’s so much fascinating stuff happening all around us, that’s usually hidden from view or overlooked. I too had a discovery moment today: Chinese praying mantises invaded our pollinator garden beds in great numbers. I evicted a few, some small ones (shameful to admit) I squished. Today there is a pair of catbirds romping around by the plants and shaking mantises down to the ground to kill them and carry away the carcasses. YESS

    Reply
  4. LifeinaCircle

    Omg thankyou for this article. I have since childhood wondered what are the insects who are making these mud pipes in every untouched nooks and corners of certain places. And I never dared to touch them. And atlast now I know.

    Reply

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