Yellow-vented hornet

This hornet has a dark orange and black banded body with black legs, and the tip of the abdomen is bright yellow, which gives the species its name. The look-alike Yellow hornet is more evenly yellow overall, with yellow legs and a yellow scutellum where this species is dark.

Colonies build paper nests that often hang from a thin branch, wire or house eave rather than sitting in a large open cavity, and can grow to roughly twenty to ninety workers by autumn. Workers hunt other insects to feed the larvae and become markedly more defensive once the nest is established.