Spending most of my life a few miles from O’Hare Field I’m rarely surprised what new species or illness shows up, and I was outside with my family when I looked down and saw something I’ve seen on local news. Calling a daughter’s attention to it I asked if it was a MURDER HORNET!!! as it’s pronounced on TV.
“Yeah, they’re starting to appear.”
I probably should tell someone.
Well, at least they’re not Green Hornets that run into gas trucks and explode.
(Extremely sick joke that only Chicago history nerds will get.)
Ay, Yi Yi.!!
That’s scary.
Well murder hornets might run into some stiff competition in Chicago.
University of Illinois extension service thinks it’s very unlikely that the giant hornet will make it to Illinois. Perhaps you saw a European hornet or cicada-killer wasp.
We have been seeing some kind of large hornet here in the Cleveland area for about 4 years now. They appear in the fall and for a week or two are around at dusk. My neighbor has frequent cook outs and is always on the lookout for them. I don’t know what they are but they are huge compared to regular white faced hornets. They appear several at a time so are not cicada killers.
Dennis
I’ve had multiple simultaneous cicada killer wasp burrows in my yard.
Given that it’s that time in 1.7 decades, it probably was a cicada killer, but it looked burlier than those wiki photos, and with shorter wings.
I wonder if they increase in number when swarms occur.