Face to face with Sweetie...

It seems to have been a good year for hornets. I saw plenty of workers foraging for insects during September and October, but by now only the young queens are likely to still be alive. A hornet nest lasts only a year: drones die after mating and the workers and the old queen die off in late autumn.

After lunch there was a knock at the door and I was presented with two young queen hornets in a jam-jar! Our neighbours were having a willow felled and these two had been found hibernating in a cavity within the rotten trunk. How could I look a blip hornet in the mouth, specially on a cold and miserable November day?

Regular visitors will know that I love wasps, and hornets Vespa crabro are by far the biggest and most magnificent wasp in the UK. Their size, and the rather menacing throbbing hum when they fly, has given them an undeserved reputation for being fearsome. In fact hornets are less aggressive than many more frequently encountered wasp species. . They generally only sting in defence of their nest or when something picks them up and their stings are no more dangerous to humans than a wasp's.

I placed this one, the calmest of the two, on a tree trunk in the garden to be photographed. She was perfectly well behaved (partly because she was rather chilly) and we spent some time looking at each other, with scarcely 20cm between us. We plan to find the queens an alternative safe overwintering spot, possibly in damp wood in the garage, and will then provide nest boxes next spring to see if we can persuade one or both of them to stay in the garden.

Initially, the queen will construct a small nest and lay eggs within it. The young are fed mainly on insects whilst the adults subsist mainly on nectar, sap and other sugary secretions. Once the workers start to emerge as adults, they expand the nest, which is constructed of papery material derived from rotten wood, which the hornets chew and apply as paste. The nest is protected by an envelope. The outer surface is striped cream, brown, yellow and white and has characteristic 'bubbles' or 'blisters', which probably help regulate the temperature of the nest. Late in summer, males and queens are produced. Mated queens are the only individuals that over-winter and the cycle is repeated.