The apple harvest from our two trees, one pink and one green, is carried out with great care and respect for the wasps and hornets that share the tree. My daughter turns over a lollipop-red discovery that nestles against its half-hollowed neighbor and the hornet inside. The caramel-and-amber hornet is tamer than wasps and carries a chunk of apple the size of a fat grain of wheat in its jaws, its yellow butt glowing across the field beyond.
The rich, cider-like smell and hum provide a sensory break for anyone who comes through the garden gate. Under the trees, wind thuds, sending short flotillas of thistledown and insects into the air. A single peacock butterfly flaps its wings possessively over a juicy green rust-brown. We carefully fill baskets. One wasp-hollowed apple contains a whole rugby-striped scrumping scrum of 12. The skins of finished apples bend like discarded candy wrappers.
There is a wasp nest in the attic every year and we almost always manage to live with it. This year there are more insects and fewer, but there are two – one surprises us after we have been away for a week and reports in rings of ochre-coloured spots around a lamp. I initially think the ticking sound is a leak in the roof. In a narrow corner of the attic the comb of the wasp nest pushes itself out of its space, the wasps solve their expansion problem by gnawing through the ceiling plaster.
Related: Country Diary: Life is easy for these summer insects
The next day, several have broken through and we have to take action. Rod, the exterminator, is refreshingly pro-wasp. “If you can live with them, do so; they’re wonderful creatures,” he says. “And hornets! I hate dealing with wasp nests. Beautiful, gentle things.”
My daughter and our neighbor have agreed to continue living in the attic between their bedrooms. There is a whole September building space upstairs, and maybe a frost period not too far away.
My daughter falls asleep to the rhythmic scraping of feminine diligence as they add the last honeycomb cells to the intricate structure of their paper lanterns.
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