CLOSED: European Hornets

Trying to figure out if this is Vespa crabro subpecies germana

Gahh!!!!!

(sorry)

They have a red head, with a yellow face

Hey, Gahh ahead !! But these critters are docile. I almost tried to scoot one around to get a better picture of its face

From what I can find, the European Hornets in America are the subspecies germana... there's an entry in bugfiles, but no pictures - so far, Magpye has some there but not under the germana subspecies. Maybe they should be?

Anyway, just playing with the new camera. I never saw these before. I'm back in Maryland, in a kind of boony area - there's a big forest right here anyway. Normally these wasps/hornets live in trees, but they'll use attics, too.
I thought wallaby1 might know more about these, and maybe I'd put a couple pics in the germana ssp. bug file, if that's where they belong.

This message was edited Sep 20, 2007 12:41 AM

Hi claypa, I dug up my old thread on these, they are gentle giants too, they can be very timid and fly off for a start until they get used to you. This is the second year I have had them, I usually only see one but last year for a start there was two in my greenhouse eating the grapes. They would make a quick getaway when I approached and they are scary, the noise they make is frightening.

When one turned up this year it came at night and hit the window, light attracts them, it ended up inside so there was I with a plastic cup trying to get it from the inset ceiling light! It comes to my bath tub and the neighbours pond for a drink, I got some great pics with my new camera!

This German site gives a lot of info but not which subspecies you might have in the US, I found mine by searching them on google and I might have seen yours but I would need to do some more research. I haven't got time to do that just now but if you haven't found it later I will have a search around.

http://www.vespa-crabro.de/hornets.htm

http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/731729/

I just went to the next page on that site and the subsp. germana has a red 'V on the thorax, it looks like yours has that so yes it would be that unless another one has it too.

http://www.vespa-crabro.de/hornets2.htm

Thanks wallaby! I saw that site, but I neglected to look at the next page. I'll keep looking

Sorry to pull up a dead thread, but I had always been curious about these types of hornets, specifically what they were. Seeing the picture at the top of the thread is the first time I've seen one since I saw one in person. I lived in Southeast Massachusetts during Hurricane Bob, and afterwards, our yard was infested with these hornets, of which I had never seen before. They were easily twice the size of any hornet or wasp I had ever seen (around an inch long at least). The used to feed on the lilac trees we had in our back yard. They were around for a few years, but eventually disappeared. I was only stung once, when I was swimming late one night and tried to swat one out of the pool that was floating in the water (I was 11, cut me some slack).

I remember searching the library, trying to figure out what they were, but thanks to the internet and random interest sparked by seeing Japanese Giant Hornets on NGCHD, I was able to finally figure out what type of wasp they were.

Does anyone know if they are in parts of the US, and why they suddenly appeared in Massachusetts after the hurricane?

Hi Stevece80 - no problem bumping up a thread!

Do you mean the Japanese Giant Hornets? Or the European Hornets? The European Hornets / Vespa crabro were brought to the US more than a hundred years ago, to New York. One of the links wallaby1 posted above shows a range map; in the U.S., I think they're most common in New England and the east.

I can't find anything about the Japanese Hornets being here... but we do have the Cicada Hunter wasps, which are just as big and look kind of similar.

Just a guess, but the Europen Hornets live in trees in forests, sometimes attics. Maybe they were made homeless by the storm and had to find other quarters?