AKA – bald hornet, white-faced hornet, white-tailed hornet, spruce wasp, blackjacket, and bull wasp. Colonies can contain 400 to 1000 workers and builds a characteristic large hanging paper nest up to 58 centimetres in length. Workers aggressively defend their nest by repeatedly stinging invaders. Males in this species are haploid (carrying two complete sets of chromosomes) and females are diploid (two sets of chromosomes or double the haploid number of chromosomes in the germ cell). Worker females can lay eggs which develop into males. Matricide (the killing of one’s mother) might occur after sufficient workers have been raised and queen-destined eggs have been laid, in order to give workers a reproductive advantage. Nests are layered hexagonal combs covered by a mottled gray paper envelope -this paper envelope is built by collecting and chewing naturally occurring wood fibers. The wood fiber mixes with their saliva to become a pulpy substance that they can then form into place.