| * Cool stuff starts happening after the 1:00 mark. I heard a buzzing commotion, and saw this pair of battling bugs fall from the sky and land on the top of the white van with a thud. By the time I got my digital camera out to record, the wasp had already killed the cicada. The roof of the van was higher than I could see, so I held my camera up and tried holding it still as I rested my hand on the roof. Sorry for the shakiness, the video was zoomed in to the max, and I was standing on my toes to record above my head. The wasp made a meal of the cicada for about 10 minutes, but I only filmed some of it, and cut it down to better parts. In the beginning, after righting the cicada, the wasp opens a flap on the cicada's underside to stick it's mandibles in. Later, the wasp ejects fluids from it's abdomen twice. When he's finished, he flies away. Wasp = Sphecius speciosus, aka Cicada Killer Wasp, Giant Cicada Killer, and Sand Hornet The camera is a Canon SD600. This occurred in Park Slope, Brooklyn, July 24, 2009, 11am. |
