. [Articles about birds from National geographic magazine]. Birds. 72 THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE. USING STING PARALYZES lul Henri Fabre ITS PREY The May beetle larva, too large to be carried away, is scientifically immobilized and left in its tracks with an egg of the wasp iScolia) attached to its body. Upon hatching, the grub will find itself in the midst of an ample food supply. Thousands of wasps have been imported recently from Chosen (Korea) to combat the Japanese beetle by laying their eggs in its larvae. guard is a male, or a lone female, it imme- diately turns aroun
. [Articles about birds from National geographic magazine]. Birds. 72 THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE. USING STING PARALYZES lul Henri Fabre ITS PREY The May beetle larva, too large to be carried away, is scientifically immobilized and left in its tracks with an egg of the wasp iScolia) attached to its body. Upon hatching, the grub will find itself in the midst of an ample food supply. Thousands of wasps have been imported recently from Chosen (Korea) to combat the Japanese beetle by laying their eggs in its larvae. guard is a male, or a lone female, it imme- diately turns around and ei^'ectively blocks the entrance with its abdomen (Plate VII, upper right). When a velvet ant gains entrance to a burrow it lays its eggs in the cells and its offspring feed on the young bees. Various kinds of digger wasps catch and kill the mother bees themselves and store them away beneath the ground to serve as food for their young. In my little colony there are two burrows of one kind of these bee-catching wasps (PhUanthus gibbosus, Color Plate VII, top, lower right), KILLERS SHOW A CERTAIN DELICACY Although these wasps are storing their cells with the dead bodies of my little friends right in their own village, they sht)W a certain amount of delicacy in their mur- derous work. For they never trouble the bees on their nesting ground, but fly some distance away and catch them on my neigh- bors' flowers. About these bee colonies you will notice tachinid flies (Metopia leucoccphala, Plate VII, top, upper left) watching for an opportunity to lay their eggs in the bees' burrows. Their young live within the bodies of the baby bees. Dancing about the bees as they return laden with pollen you see much smaller phorid flies {Megaselia diver gens, Color Plate VII, upper, right center). They also live at the bees' expense, as do others, in- cluding minute slender wasps (Loxoiropa, sp., Plate VII, top, lower left), canny, crafty things that sneak past the guard. The burrowing bees
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