Mud-daubing

Yellow-legged Mud-dauber Wasp/Sceliphron caementarium working on a second mud tube structure next to an already completed one. Once this tube is done, she will stuff it with paralyzed spiders and lay an egg in there. Note that the mud ball she’s collected somewhere nearby is larger than her head.

Sometimes they clump more mud around these tubes for a freeform sort of mess. I watched her leave and return about three minutes later. Then I waited again.

Something hit my finger. It looked like mud. I looked down. Did she dump her mud ball on me???

Here it is about 13 minutes later, drying out.

Three days later after the airborne toxic event.

Six days later. The tubes themselves are covered over with another layer of mud.

The mud ball was still there, btw.