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Sticker of Saxon wasp
Bug card No. 3750 of 4,939

Saxon wasp

Dolichovespula saxonica
Name means: “Its group name comes from the Greek word for long, because of its long face.”
Eats: A bit of everythingWasps and hornetsGardens and meadows6 legs

The Saxon wasp is a black and yellow striped wasp with a long face. It lives in big families and builds a round grey paper nest that hangs from branches, bushes or the roofs of houses. It is a bit bigger than most of its wasp cousins.

Lives in
Most of Europe and northern and central Asia, in woods, countryside, parks and towns
Length
1.1 to 1.5 cm (0.43 to 0.59 in)
Top speed
about 21 km/h (13 mph)
Flying, estimate
Can it hurt you?
Can sting

Watch out! Read about its close cousin on Venom Wiki →

What does it eat?
Like other social wasps, the grown-ups bring food home to feed the babies in the nest.
For real!Photo of Saxon wasp
Picture by Pjt56 --- If you use the picture outside Wikipedia I would appreciate a short e-mail to [email protected] or a message on my discussion page. CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

How big is it?

How long is it?

Saxon wasp about 1.5 cm long (0.59 in)A grain of rice about 6 mm (0.24 in)A toy building brick about 3.2 cm (1.3 in)A crayon about 9 cm (3.5 in)
as long as 2.5 grains of rice in a rowcould fly across a whole football pitch in 18 secondsmoves 390 times its own body length every second

How big is Saxon wasp compared to YOU?

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How fast is it?

cool stuff

Fun facts

1

Its nest is made from rotting wood that the wasps chew into grey paper.

2

The ball-shaped nest is about 25 centimetres wide and has just one door, at the bottom.

3

The queen is the biggest wasp in the family, up to almost 2 centimetres long.

4

Only the young queens live through the winter. In spring each one starts a brand new nest all by herself.

5

The wasps leave smell trails to help each other find the way home to the nest.

you asked

Most asked questions about Saxon wasp

?Where does the Saxon wasp build its nest?

Above the ground, hanging from tree branches, bushes, roofs, porches or the walls of buildings.

?How big is a Saxon wasp?

The workers are about 1.1 to 1.5 centimetres long, and the queen is even bigger.

For bug experts

Scientific name
Dolichovespula saxonica
Group
Wasps and hornets
Family
Vespidae
Classification
Insecta > Hymenoptera > Vespidae
Lives on
Europe, Asia

Where the facts come from

  1. Dolichovespula saxonica (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
  2. Picture by Pjt56 --- If you use the picture outside Wikipedia I would appreciate a short e-mail to [email protected] or a message on my discussion page. CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.

If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.

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