Queen Hornet in My Bedroom

wegs said:
It's a good thing you're not allergic! :eek:
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Yes. I’ve been stung enough over the years to know I’m not, thank goodness. When I was a teenager I used to let wasps investigate me. They are quite systematic, unlike flies which just zoom around at random. When they hover close to your hand or land on it they seem very gentle, almost caressing. You can just sense the air movement from their wings. It’s usually when you flap your arms about that you get stung. Or if you disturb a nest of course.

In the Emirates we used to get very large red wasps or hornets, in the mountains ( Jebel Hajar) We used to call them “bloody hells”, because that was the usual exclamation when confronted by one. The biggest were even known as a “bloody hell - JESUS!” as they flew towards your face. Nobody I knew was ever stung by one, though. Looking these things up it may well be the oriental hornet:

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Fun fact: The European hornet has an unusual hunting trick for bees/wasps/hornets - they can fly and hunt at night. Its large eyes are specially adapted to low light, letting it hunt insects like moths after sunset.
 
Hercules Rockefeller said:
Fun fact: The European hornet has an unusual hunting trick for bees/wasps/hornets - they can fly and hunt at night. Its large eyes are specially adapted to low light, letting it hunt insects like moths after sunset.
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I didn't know that, but it is corroborated by this French site I came across this morning: https://biodiversitefrance.com/frelon-europeen/

It's interesting to see how le frelon is viewed by this French writer. On the whole the tone is sympathetic, pointing out the hornet's role in keeping down the numbers of niusance insects. I was interested to see it mentions one of these is the wax moth, the larvae of which eats the wax in the honeycombs of bee colonies, damaging the colony.

It also says, curiously, that they can't hover, unlke the smaller, more agile asian hornet, which is the one that destroys bee colonies. (Oddly enough there is French military helicopter called le frelon. So perhaps a bad choice of name.)

But some amusing choices of phrase: un peu comme la version XXL de la guêpe.
 
I've heard the French subspecies will often lay just one egg at a time because one egg is un oeuf.

:cool:
 
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