Wasps: Social and Solitary

by Elizabeth G. Peckham, George W. Peckham, James H. Emerton (Illustrator)

Not Long since I wrote to a friend, a nature lover, as “The most charming monograph in any department of our natural history that I have read in many a year is on our solitary wasps, by George W. Peckham and his wife, of Wisconsin,—a work so delightful and instructive that it is a great pity it is not published in some popular series of nature books, where it could reach its fit audience, instead of being handicapped as a State publication.” This end has now been brought about, and the book—revised and enlarged with much new material and many new illustrations—placed within easy reach of all nature lovers, to whom it gives me pleasure to commend it. It is a wonderful record of patient, exact, and loving observation, which has all the interest of a romance. It opens up a world of Lilliput right at our feet, wherein the little people amuse and delight us with their curious human foibles and whimsicalities, and surprise us with their intelligence and individuality. Here I had been saying in print that I looked upon insects as perfect automata, and all of the same class as nearly alike as the leaves of the trees or the sands upon the beach. I had not reckoned with the Peckhams and their solitary wasps. The solitary ways of these insects seem to bring out their individual traits, and they differ one from another, more than any other wild creatures known to me. It has been thought that man is the only tool-using animal, yet here is one of these wasps, Ammophila, that uses a little pebble to pound down the earth over her nest. She takes the pebble in her mandibles, as you or I would take a stone in our hand, and uses it as a hammer to pound down the soil above the cavity that holds her egg. This is a remarkable fact; so far as I know there is no other animal on this continent that makes any mechanical use of an object or substance foreign to its own body in this way. The act stamps Ammophila as a tool-using animal.
I am free to confess that I have had more delight in reading this book than in reading any other nature book in a long time. Such a queer little people as it reveals to us, so whimsical, so fickle, so fussy, so forgetful, so wise and yet so foolish, such victims of routine and yet so individual, with such apparent foresight and yet such thoughtlessness, finding their way back to the same square inch of earth in the monotonous expanse of a wide plowed field with unfailing accuracy, and then at times finishing their cell and sealing it up without the spider and the egg; hardly any two alike; one nervous and excitable, another calm and unhurried; one careless in her work, another neat and thorough; this one suspicious, that one confiding; one species digging its burrow before it captures its game, others capturing the game and then digging the hole; one wasp hanging its spider up in the fork of a weed to keep it away from the ants while it works at its nest, and then running to it every moment or two to see that it is safe; another laying the insect on the ground while it digs,—verily a queer little people, with a lot of wild nature about them, and of human nature, too.

131 pages, Kindle Edition

Published February 2, 2015

Reviews

[Forked Radish]

Wasps and their repulsive habits are examined.

[Cris Edwards · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really enjoyed the tone of the authors in their absolute fascination and delight at observing wasps. They are overjoyed by the diverse community of wasps that resided around their Wisconsin estate at the time, which featured, it seems, an expansive garden, island, and lots of wooded areas.

Thanks to this book, I have new-found admiration and respect for wasps. I'd always assumed that they were almost robotic in their utilitarian instincts and this book proved that I was wrong. The authors, a married couple, go to great lengths to show how each individual wasp has her* own personality, style, and methods. Wasps are intelligent and do many things we'd expect of people, such as leisure time, meditation, and having their own individual preferences for how things should be done. The authors will observe a single wasp with incredible patience and sympathy, often rooting for her success and taking time to ponder what is going through that wasp's mind under problematic circumstances.

However, the meticulous notes, in the service of the scientific contributions this book offers, will grow tedious for the casual reader. They're necessary and bring up some conclusions about wasps that seem to add to or contradict the existing understanding of wasps at the time, which is important. However, it's laborious getting through long passages about the minute-by-minute activities of an individual wasp.

The care and respect that the authors give to their subjects was really the most interesting part of this book, and it certainly changed my view of wasps. The illustrations are wonderful, too.

*Nearly all of the wasps observed were females. Male wasps are rarely talked about here.

[Samwise Chamberlain · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book by wife and husband team Elizabeth and George Pekham reads alright as a dilettante entomological study. Having been written in 1905, the differences in approach and experiment were interesting to observe. Behaviors are explained, but little else. Overall conclusions are left vague, but enough detail is included where one can draw one's own conclusions.