Over many fields, you will hear the drone of a crop-duster or the hiss of pesticides from a tractor, yet over our field you hear only the buzz of insects and the swaying of the grasses nearby. I look at this field much differently than the human who dropped me here. For starters, I cannot see as well as a human and live in an altogether smaller world. I was dropped on this field only a few months ago along with twenty-five thousand relatives. We were placed here to do what we do best, eat other insects. You see we are wasps, the most common insect used to eradicate other pesky insects. We are helped in our duties by Ladybugs and Lacewings, being the next most common insect used as pest controls.

As we enter this story, our colony scouts just found the head of our missing scout. This horrified us, for we had never been preyed on before in this field. We had immediately sent ambassadors to the colonies of Lacewings and Ladybugs. This took a while, for the ladybugs were dispersed at this time in summer, and the lacewings are most solitary.

In a few days, we had a meeting of the leaders of PICI. For those who do not know what that stands for, it is Pest Insect Control by Insects. In the middle of this council, a lone scout burst in gibbering that he had seen a lacewing being devoured by a monster. It had a small triangular head with huge multifaceted eyes. The scout informed us that its most striking feature was two, long scythe-like arms. The council agreed that these monstrosities could not go on terrorizing us. The very next day, we had declared war on these monsters. In a week, we had been beaten back at many fronts, including the Apricot Tree and the Battle of Fallen Apples. We would have had a crushing victory if the fruit flies had not joined in from Funce. From captured spies, we learned that the monsters were Praying Mantises, another type of pest control insect.

The final battle was at the Siege of the Peach Tree, and our forces surrendered. Soon the treaty of Fruris was signed, and we gave the Praying Mantises the control of half the garden. Soon we learned that the Praying Mantises were just as effective at killing pests as we were; they just took longer to grow than we wasps. Praying Mantises are preferred in Hawaii where they are the most common pest control insects, more than in California. We wasps learned to never declare war on any other thing and how to coexist with other types of insects.

-Excerpt from Wasp History Book of See Canyon Fruit Ranch.