The Spider and The Wasp (Fable)

A little House Spider with his skill and cleverness had caught every kind of insect you can imagine, from your average fly to moths, butterflies, damselflies and even a small dragon fly. But, on this particular bright day, near the end of Summer perched on his little web, he watched a bumble bee happily collecting pollen and nectar for her hive. He twiddled a little piece of web between his front legs and thought to himself

“I have captured many a bee, but never have never even considered capturing a wasp!”

So the little House Spider scampered of to see Mrs Wolf Spider, to see if she knew where the best place was to capture one

“Well” Said Mrs Wolf Spider “I believe there be a wasp nest near the river on the apple tree, if you really would like to know Mr House Spider”

So off he scampered to the apple tree by the river and set up his web by the wasp’s nest.  He wove his clever little web by the entrance and waited. You see, the spiders clever technique is to lie in wait in the place where he knows plenty of his targets shall be. After all, the more wasps there is the more likely he is to catch one correct? Well, not this time, because as soon as the House Spider set up his web, the wasps immediately started bombarding the spider until he left. The little House Spider was creeping back home, when he bumped into the very tall Mr Harvestman, who had seen the little spiders attempt at capturing a wasp.

“Honestly Mr House Sider” said the tall Mr Harvestmen “these are wasps sir, which are not only dam aggressive but also work as a team, so you need to be far more clever then that!”

So the little house spider decided to change his strategy. He set up his little web further away from the wasp’s big, round nest, so that only a single wasp would stray into his web, instead of a whole mob of them. But even a single little wasp proved to be too much of a challenge and no matter how hard he tried, he just couldn’t capture one. So he asked Mrs Wolf Spider, Mr Harvestman and all the creatures of the undergrowth. But despite of their best efforts, none were really any help.

Upset and frustrated, he sat on the leaf of an apple tree and pondered and pondered and pondered. Then he noticed a wasp. Then another one. And another one. All of a sudden there was a swarm of them. But there was something odd about them. They kept bumping into things and couldn’t fly straight. Then he remembered!  The apples!  In late Summer, the wasps eat the rotten apples off the floor and that makes them dizzy!

 Then an idea struck the little House Spider. No spider had done this before! He will use the apples as bait! So he set up his web near (but not too near of course, otherwise he will capture too many of them!)the fallen apples and wait for one of the dizzy wasps to fly into his trap! So he quickly set up his web and before long had caught one of the wasps who was too dizzy to fly away. He had done it! He caught a wasp!

 He showed off his catch to Mrs Wolf Spider, Mr Harvestman and all the creatures of the undergrowth. He then took the little wasp home to his wasp nest and let him go.