Hornets; Nest Building in the Forest of Dean - 1st October 2011

I found some hornets while showing a film crew from BBC Autumnwatch around the Forest of Dean. If they filmed them, it will be shown on TV on Friday 7th October.
I have been to this site many times throughout the summer and the hornets were not there, so they have only just started this nest.
I wanted to photograph and film them before they disappeared to I went back on the 1st October to film and photograph them myself.
We have seen a mini heat wave recently and this has provoked the hornets to start building a nest "at the wrong time of the year!)
Hornets usually build their nests in the spring and it was very unusual and unexpected behaviour to see them building one in early autumn. They usually leave the nest to mate around early to mid autumn and the males die shortly after mating. The workers and queens die around mid to late autumn. Only fertilized queens survive the winter.

At around 5cm long they were quite big and as I was only a metre away from the nest, I had to be careful. One sting from a hornet will send off a pheromone, which will mobilise the whole colony and this is when the whole nest can attack. With no barb on their stinger like the wasp, a hornet can sting multiple times and if you have the entire colony stinging you multiple times, it can be extremely dangerous and painful!
Saying this; I spent over an hour with them, just a few inches away at times and they tolerated me. I even put a macro lens on and photographed a guard hornet up close. He did attack the front on the camera at one point, but he didn't sting - to my relief!

In this video...

Guard hornet
Nest building
Discarded larvae

Category:

Education

Tags:

• insect
• wasp
• hornet
• wildlife
• Forest of Dean
• robin ward
• sting
• stung
• pheromone
• nest
• hornets building nest

[MattGraz34]

Amazing video!!!!! How did you get that close?