Ruud Kleinpaste: Hibernatory Wasps

The Vespula group of invasive wasps are still active, but starting to show signs of slowly shutting up shop for the winter. Vespula germanica (German wasp) and Vespula vulgaris (common wasp) are the two species with no sense of humour in New Zealand.  

At this time of the year the action is all about the queens: the old queens (as well as the males and old workers) are facing the end of their lives, and the brand-new queens are preparing for hibernation.  

For new queens that means mating in May – after that she can find a nice spot to hibernate till mid-September. I usually find them in stored firewood, nice dark nooks and crannies.   

This is also the time when most active wasp nests die – early winter. Most, but not all!  

Some nests (around 5-10%) survive the winter and grow bigger and bigger during the following year – a couple of meters in size with a million cells. Now, that is a decent method of production of babies and adults.  

A nest that survives the winter has the advantage of carrying on without requiring the construction of a new nest.  

During May, young queens go on the look out for a hibernation site. During winter that will be a very quiet place (until you come cross that afore mentioned firewood stash in the shed). 

Overwintering Vespula Queens  

In spring, when temperatures become a little more agreeable, the queens will leave the hibernation spot and try locate some sustenance in the form of early-flowering plants with nectar.  

This will start the early-season cycle off – finding a small nest site and starting a brand-new nest is the very first priority.  

Chewing wood to create a version of paper mâché is a clever way the wasps produce cells where the larvae (young immature wasps) can live for 30 to 45 days, initially fed by the queen (later by the workers as the nest grows larger). 

Wasp chewing wood to masticate into cells. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack Teams podcast
from News Talks at be.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Rude Climb past is in the garden for us this morning.

Speaker 3 (00:15):
Hey Rude, Hey, good morning. Have you got any troubles
with wash.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
I do have troubles with wasp. I'm glad that we're
talking about this.

Speaker 4 (00:23):
I know we've we've mentioned wasps before, but we've had
I've had a few bit of trouble with wasps at
our place. And there's actually a little nest on my
roof because we've got kind of like we've got a
skylight and there's some sort of flashing around the skylight,
and I think that the wasps have formed a little
nest in there.

Speaker 3 (00:42):
It's are you see that nest?

Speaker 2 (00:44):
Well.

Speaker 4 (00:44):
I haven't stuck my head right down at because the
times that I've been up on the roof recently, it's
been in the middle of the day when it's been
quite hot and so the wasp been quite active. I
didn't think that was the time to be putting my
arm down in between the flashing or anything like that.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
But yeah, it is, Like I.

Speaker 4 (01:00):
Mean, I think people everywhere have them at the moment,
Like my mom and Dad's place get heaps or wasp nest.

Speaker 3 (01:06):
Yeah, yeah, sometimes if it's small nests, you know, with
the with an underside, with all those if you like
those little cells, then it's usually a paper wasp species,
you know, one of the things that makes literally upside
down nests. Uh. And and these guys and those guys
actually have finished basically already. What you see of paper

(01:28):
wasp nests at the moment is a whole lot of
these boys and girls literally having a leck display, which
is a lovely term for the boys are sitting there
trying to get a girlfriend before the winter, so that
at least you know that the sperm goes into the
next generation if you like. Yeah, right, and that is

(01:48):
that is actually quite cool to watch, because these wasps
are not interested in you. They're only interested in having
having a girlfriend coming. So they are the ones that
quite often make these little little nests on top of
your roofs, are on the inside or whatever. Yeah, that's
but the buggers, either German wasps or the common wasps,

(02:11):
and they have a totally they have a slightly different
technique at the moment, they make reasonably sizeable nests. We're
talking football size two footballs three footballs that sort of subside,
and if they have already survived one summer and one winter,

(02:32):
they can use that same nest or stay that nest.
And that nest could be two meters tall. Wow, unbelievable,
that's crazy. Oh yeah, yeah, no problem, and with millions
of cells, so that that, yeah, that would be a
nest that actually literally survives one winter, sometimes even two winters.
It becomes huge.

Speaker 2 (02:53):
Right, yeah, Now, this is.

Speaker 3 (02:55):
What we see right now. The queens are active and
they're looking. They're basically finding a place to hibernate. And
if they've lost their nest, that's okay. They're all on
their own and you can start.

Speaker 2 (03:07):
Again, right, so now the time to get rid of them, though.

Speaker 3 (03:13):
Yes you could do if you like, if you if
you find queens and things like that, what they will
do is they are trying to look for a place
to hibernate. For instance, in my particular case, it's very simple.
Often in the firewood that I've got stacked, you know
what I mean, nice nooks and trains, little holes and
things like that. And when you pick up some firewood

(03:35):
to go and make your house form, and you you
pick the firewood without looking you sometimes can get done
by these wonderful stings. That's quite nicely, by the way. Yeah,
so you've got to be watching, watching for things like that.
They love sitting there, uh and that's basically what they're
going to do now. And they sit there in your

(03:57):
firewood or in nooks and cranies. You are in little
holes until this coming spring, and that's when it all
starts again with papermasey make brand new cells. And it
looks gorgeous.

Speaker 4 (04:10):
Yes, it looks gorgeous until you've got the throwing wealth
on your arm as a result.

Speaker 2 (04:14):
Hey, thank you, ruy. Yeah, I do.

Speaker 4 (04:16):
I need to get onto it on the tics check.
Stop being a whusk, get onto it. Yeah, all right,
I will. It was honestly really hot. I didn't want
to be stung on top of the roof. That felt
like a Rispeaker disaster.

Speaker 2 (04:25):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (04:27):
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