Found this guy bumping arounds on a window in my living room. Not surprised to find out it is a Polistes dominulus, which appears to be the primary wasp species around here, to the exclusion of other species.
First Wasp of the Year
Moderators: rjlittlefield, ChrisR, Chris S., Pau
-
- Posts: 5090
- Joined: Sun Jan 15, 2012 12:31 pm
First Wasp of the Year
Michael Reese Much FRMS EMS Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, USA
- rjlittlefield
- Site Admin
- Posts: 23608
- Joined: Tue Aug 01, 2006 8:34 am
- Location: Richland, Washington State, USA
- Contact:
Re: First Wasp of the Year
Nice image, but this does not look at all like Polistes dominulus. That immigrant is bright yellow and black; this image shows on my monitor as a rich reddish orange. Based on the color, I'm thinking one of the natives, maybe P. fuscatus or P. carolina.
--Rik
--Rik
- MarkSturtevant
- Posts: 1947
- Joined: Sat Nov 21, 2015 6:52 pm
- Location: Michigan, U.S.A.
- Contact:
Re: First Wasp of the Year
An excellent stack. You are right about the growing presence of P. dominulus. The European paper wasp is displacing native paper wasps, mainly b/c they start their nests earlier and so take the 'good' spots.
Mark Sturtevant
Dept. of Still Waters
Dept. of Still Waters