The mode of carrying their booty is in these wasps instinctive, and relatively uniform. Ammophila urnaria grasps the caterpillar, near the anterior end, in her mandibles, and carries or drags it beneath her legs, walking forwards. It is generally but not always with the ventral surface uppermost. Pompilus takes hold of her spider anywhere, but always drags it over the ground, walking backwards. Oxybelus clasps her fly with her hind legs; Bembex with the second pair. Each works after her own fashion in a way that is relatively uniform for each species.
The general style of the nest, its mode of construction, and its method of closure, are always performed, says Dr. Peckham, by each species in a similar manner, not indeed in circumstantial detail, but quite in the same way in a broad sense. Variation or modification is always present, but the tendency to depart from a nest of a given type is not excessive. Some dig in the ground curved tunnels, with or without one or more chambers. Others bore into decaying wood; others use straws, or make tunnels in bramble stems; while the mud-daubers build cells in which to store the food and lay the egg. This is sometimes deposited on the first, sometimes on the last, sometimes on some intermediate victim, but generally in much the same place and position. Ammophila, for instance, lays it on the side of the sixth or seventh segment—that is to say, in about the mid position.
Some species first capture their prey, and then make the nest in which it is to be entombed. Others first prepare the nest, and then carry or drag their prey to it—often from considerable distances—quite irrespective of what seems to us the more appropriate method of the two under the particular circumstances of the case. And the way in which the victim is dragged into the nest is similarly a matter of inheritance. Each way is characteristic of the species concerned, and would be an important part of any definition of the animal based upon its modes of behaviour. For example, a Sphex places her grasshopper just at the entrance of the nest, which she then enters herself before dragging in her prey by the antennæ. When the wasp was in the hole, Fabre moved the victim a little way off; the wasp came out, brought the grasshopper to the entrance as before, and went in a second time. This was repeated about forty times, each time with the same result, until the patience of the naturalist was exhausted, and the persistent wasp took her booty in after her appropriate fashion. She must place the grasshopper close to the opening; she must then descend and examine the nest, and, after that, must drag it down. Nothing less than the performance of these acts in a certain order satisfies her instinctive impulse.
In a private letter, from which he kindly allows me to quote, Dr. Peckham says: “We have recently made some experiments on this wasp (Sphex ichneumonea). First we allow her to carry in her prey undisturbed, to see how far she was faithful to the traditions of her ancestors, and to observe her normal methods. On the next day, when she had placed her grasshopper just at the opening of the nest, and while she was below, we drew it back to a little distance. She came out, and we both repeated our operations four times—she running down into the nest, always after getting the grasshopper into position, and we as regularly drawing it away. The fifth time she changed her plan, seized it by the head and backed into the nest with it. The next day, at the fourth trial, she straddled it and walked head first into the nest with it; and on the fourth day, at the eighth trial, she backed in with it as on the second day.” These interesting observations show that the wasp has sufficient intelligence to modify her procedure in accordance with an unwonted situation. The “consecutive necessity,” as it has been termed, has a potent influence, but is not absolute.
Fabre notes a case of similar consecutive necessity in the case of the mason bee, Chalicodoma. If while a bee is provisioning its nest with honey and pollen the structure be destroyed, she sometimes breaks open a completed cell, and, having done so, goes on bringing more provision, though the cell already contains a sufficient store of food; and only when she has completed the superfluous storing does she deposit her egg and seal up the cell. So, too, when the cell is removed in an early stage of construction, and another completed cell already partially stored is substituted, the bee, instead of simply adopting the new cell, goes on building until the cell is as much as one-third beyond the usual height; then, and not till then, does she proceed in due course to the next stage of the instinctive procedure, the provisioning of the cell.
From our general knowledge of animal nature, we should expect to find parasitic forms ready to take advantage of the material stored by such insects as the solitary wasps and the mason bees. It is said that Chalicodoma provides nourishment to the larvæ of some sixteen unbidden guests. A parasitic bee (Stelis nasuta) breaks open a closed cell, and, after depositing its eggs, seals it up again with mortar. Since her eggs and larvæ develop more rapidly than those of the mason bee, they are first served with the store of provision, while the rightful owner is done out of its inheritance. By a curious act, of what appears to us like retributive justice, these parasitic larvæ sometimes fall a prey to another parasite, also a hymenopterous insect named Monodontomerus, the larvæ of which prey on the young of both bees. Another genus of the same family, Leucopsis (Fig. 13, F), also succeeds in piercing with its ovipositor, at a suitable spot, the walls of the Chalicodoma cell, and suspends its curious hooked egg (Fig. 13, G) on the delicate cocoon within which the chrysalis lies. Fabre found in some cases as many as five of these parasitic eggs on a single cocoon. But he never found more than one larva in any cell that he examined. The following is an epitome of his conclusions and inferences. From the parasitic egg is hatched a minute arched grub, with relatively large head and mandibles, and provided with a number of bristles, which aid it in progression (Fig. 13, H). It does not, however, at once attack the bee larva, but makes a series of excursions, the object of which is to reach and destroy any other parasitic eggs. This was not actually observed, but the eggs were found to have been destroyed, and there was seemingly no other means of destruction under the conditions maintained. The larva, this done, changes its skin and takes on a new form, destitute of bristles, with a very small head and minute mandibles (Fig. 13, I). In this new form it attacks the Chalicodoma larva, making a very small incision, through which the juices of the host are transferred to the guest without further injury to the grub. It is interesting to note that, if the facts are accurately described and the inferences are correct, there are associated with two types of instinctive behaviour two distinct types of structure. The creature can have no conscious control over its structural development, and there is no ground for assuming that it has any control over its instinctive behaviour.
Fig. 13.—Insect Larvæ. A, B, of Sitaris; C, D, E, of Argyromœba; G, H, I, of Leucopsis; F, imago of Leucopsis (after Fabre).
The specialization of structure and of instinctive behaviour, in accordance with a definite sequence of life-conditions, is even more remarkable in another of the many parasites which Chalicodoma unwittingly labours to nourish. This time it is a fly (Argyromœba), which lays a minute egg on the outside of the cell. From this egg is hatched a slender threadlike worm, barely one-twentieth of an inch in length (Fig. 13, C). It has three pairs of longish bristles near the anterior end, and a single yet longer pair at the hinder extremity. These aid it in creeping over the wall of the cell. Its small head is armed with short, stiff bristles. For many days it wanders over the surface of the cell, inserting its bristly head into each minute cranny and crack. Throughout this long period it has never a bite nor sup. Probably many of them never succeed in finding a crevice by which they can effect an entrance, but those that do manage to wriggle in undergo a change, lose their bristles, and develop a minute suctorial mouth, through which the contents of the larva are absorbed into their swelling bodies (Fig. 13, D). When fully grown they are quite helpless, and unable to get out from the cell in which they are now imprisoned. For months they lie quiescent, but in the succeeding spring they pass into a pupal condition very different from that of most flies. The relatively large head is armed with strong spines; the middle region bears bristles directed backwards; the posterior end has short spines (Fig. 13, E). Fixing itself to the interior of the cell by the latter, it strikes with its armoured head repeated blows on the walls of its prison until a breach is at last made, and sufficiently enlarged to form a suitable exit. Then the pupa-skin bursts, and the imago insect emerges and flies off. At each stage of life there is the closest relation between structure and behaviour, and each is equally adapted to a biological end of which the creature has never had an opportunity of gaining any experience.