How It Goes

Sometimes.

Bits and pieces, chunks, for this post came to me while I sat at a traffic light this afternoon. An overgrown lot across from the local post office shook loose some ideas. Mostly the wild cherry trees and the devil's spawn, Bradford pears gone rogue, did the jostling.

For some reason--reason?--I recalled my answer on a questionnaire from the Class of '71 reunion committee. Advice to my 17-year-old-self? My answer without much ado was "Relax, you have no idea what's coming". 

Which brings me around to the fact that until this summer I had no idea what a blue-winged wasp was until this specimen showed up in my pollinator bed. Turns out, the queen.

But I must go back further in the season. After admittedly lackadaisically applying a pesticide to keep the Japanese beetles off the Knockout roses, the ensuing invasion tore into the roses, Roses of Sharon, almond trees, and my plum tree. Absolutely, the worst season for the leaf-chomping, flower-mutilating hoard I've ever seen. You'll note the stripped branches of the plum, which kept growing throughout the summer. 

Early this spring when I planted out a pre-packaged pollinator bed, two of the plants were something again new to me, Lesser Catmint. 

But back to my newly discovered favorite insect queen. Turns out the Blue-winged wasps thrive on the Catmint. And, as it goes, this wasp queen and fellow females sting Japanese beetle grubs and then lay eggs that hatch and feed on the paralyzed grubs. Think I won't be planting Catmint around the yard next year?

So, when the 2020 growing season began I had never seen Japanese beetles rip into so many different plants and trees, never planted Catmint, and never noticed Blue-winged wasps before. 

Guess this year's experience out back makes me a tad wiser. Sixty-seven-year-old-self? Relax. Sometimes the unexpected comes calling. That's how it goes.