Brussels (The Brussels Morning Newspaper): Belgium is experiencing a significant decline in wasp populations with numbers at their lowest in a decade due to climate change and excessive rainfall. This impacts local ecosystems and insect health.
There have been way fewer wasps in Belgium lately. Even in mid August when there are usually lots of wasps around hardly any of them can be spotted. In Belgium they don’t have official counts but the Dutch Wasp Foundation in the Netherlands keeps an eye on the wasp population. They said to the Mediahuis newspapers that the numbers are the lowest they’ve been in ten years. Fire departments in Belgium have also noticed fewer wasp nest removals showing that there are fewer wasps around.
Why is the Belgian wasp population declining due to climate change?
The reason there are fewer wasps is because of climate change especially because of the rainy spring. Wasps usually build their nests on the ground but with all the rain the nests get flooded. Belgium has had a lot of rain recently. This also makes it hard for them to build nests in trees and even if they manage to they can’t fly out to find food because of the rain.
Rain affects various kinds of insects differently. The Asian hornet is not originally from Belgium and rain does not affect it much. The nests of Asian hornets are built in the bushy or wooded regions making them less susceptible to getting swamped. These hornets are tougher than regular wasps even during fine weather. They appear later in the calendar year most of them not being visible until September. If Belgium has another Indian summer like in October 2022 and 2023 warm and dry weather in autumn more wasps might show up. But if theres no increase in September 2024 will likely be another year with few wasps.
