Winifred!

Trying to beat the heat, Michael and I were out early this morning.  We had work to attend so there was no lazy trip to the pier!  He and I are cleaning up a bunch of mess that has laid more or less unnoticed since the last hurricane. Now these boards are the home of some billion or so termites.  Not a happy thought by far!  He and I are ridding the hillside of rotted wood and in the process also killing a few of the wicked insects that try to eat the Little Bayou House.  While dragging a large piece of plywood, he suddenly stopped and pointed at a nandina bush.  Ok..so I admit that I have poor eyesight but for the life of me, I could not see anything except the bush!  Yep!  That is a nice bush, Michael!  He grinned and pointed a bit closer.  Still nothing came into my view.  In my defense, though, the sun was at the perfect angle to throw a nice glare on the bush from where I was standing.  So I only saw "bright".  He finally put his hand right in the leaves.  Ahh, I see it....MICHAEL, THAT IS A BEE!  He looked at me incredulously...ummm.."Yep, you are right. I was showing you a bee."  Well, if my son took the time to show me a bee, I had better look at it a bit closer!

Well, now why did he not explain why he was pointing at this bee?  When I stepped closer I could see that the bee (or I suppose wasp) was trying to carry a bug that was much larger than itself.  That did indeed make this a tad interesting.  We decided the boards could wait a bit while we watched the progress of the bee/wasp thingy.  Since we were becoming quite familiar with said wasp, I decided to name her.  (And, yes, it was a her!)  Winifred!  Winifred Wasp!  Yep, that sounded rather nice!  Michael looked at me and got a funny grin on his face.."Only you, Mom, only you."  Hey, if I claim to be friends with the Bayou Critters, they have to have names..Winifred does not mind!  By this time Winifred had the grasshopper in a tight hold and was attempting to get airborne.  She buzzed and buzzed but the fat grasshopper was mighty heavy.  Finally, she took to the air!  I thought sure we had seen the last of Winifred but then she made a u-turn and came right back towards us. Uh oh!  She buzzed past us and to the porch.  Landing with a thud, she dropped her prey.  That was a long flight!  The nandina bush is nearly ten feet from the porch!

After resting a few minutes, Winifred, once again, grasped her grasshopper.  She was off again but this time only a matter of inches.  Winifred was trying to poke the grasshopper into a hole that a carpenter bee had drilled.  Ahh, Winifred believes in recycling!  I was beginning to really like Winifred!!  She is a pretty smart bee..err..wasp! (In all fairness, I realize that the small wasp probably paralyzed the carpenter bee's larva and laid her egg in the hole.  When the egg hatches, it will dine upon not only the grasshopper that the wasp shoved in the hole before closing it, but also the carpenter bee larva.)

Ok, so bug watching time was over.  Michael and I had to get back to work!  Thick clouds were building in the east and we knew that the afternoon would be filled with thunderstorms!