What Do Wasps Eat? Wasp Diet & Why They Crash NH Cookouts
TL;DR
Adult wasps drink carbohydrates — flower nectar, tree sap, honeydew, and fruit juice — for flight energy, while their larvae are fed protein. Adult workers hunt insects (caterpillars, flies, spiders) to feed the larvae in spring and early summer, then switch to scavenging sugar in late summer once the larvae have pupated and no longer need feeding. That late-season sugar shift is why August New Hampshire cookouts, apple orchards in Bedford and Londonderry, and cider operations suddenly get crashed. Solitary wasps provision specific prey instead: mud daubers stock their mud cells with spiders, and cicada killers paralyze and stock cicadas — beneficial hunters, not a threat to you.
Adult wasp diet
Liquid carbohydrates — nectar, sap, honeydew, fruit juice
Adults cannot digest solid food; UMD Extension: 'Adult wasps consume a liquid diet and are attracted to sugary substances… flower nectar, fruit juices, oozing sap, honeydew'
Larval diet
Animal protein — caterpillars, flies, spiders, soft-bodied insects
Workers hunt insects to feed the colony's developing larvae; UNH Cooperative Extension (Eaton)
Diet switch trigger
Protein → sugar after larvae pupate, late summer
Prof. Seirian Sumner (UCL): once larvae pupate 'the demand for protein foraging diminishes… [workers] will generally seek out sugary options'
NH peak scavenging window
August–September
Colony at maximum size, natural sugar supply declining, ripe fruit and cookout sweets at peak; UNH Extension / UC IPM Pest Note 7450
Why August turns wasps into uninvited guests at every NH cookout
If you have ever wondered why wasps seem to ignore you all spring and then descend on your soda can and grilled chicken the moment August arrives, the answer is a seasonal diet shift that most 'what do wasps eat' pages never bother to explain.
Wasps eat differently depending on who in the colony you are asking about, and what time of year it is. Adult workers run on carbohydrates — nectar, tree sap, honeydew secreted by aphids, and fruit juice — because their flight muscles need a constant liquid-sugar fuel source. Their larvae, however, need animal protein to develop. That creates a job: in spring and early summer, workers spend most of their foraging time hunting caterpillars, sawflies, flies, and other soft-bodied insects — chewing them into a protein paste and feeding it to the larvae growing in the nest's cells. During this phase, social wasps like paper wasps and yellowjackets are genuinely valuable in the garden, quietly suppressing the insects that eat your vegetables and ornamentals.
Then, typically in late July and August, the larvae pupate. Once they do, the colony's protein demand collapses almost overnight. Adult workers no longer have a reason to hunt insects — they only need to feed themselves, which means sugar. At the same moment, the colony has reached its annual peak size, so there are more foragers than ever. The result: a large, sugar-hungry wasp force descends on every open soda, dropped apple, and backyard BBQ in New Hampshire exactly when people are spending the most time outdoors. Bedford and Londonderry apple orchards, sugar-shack and cider operations, and lakeside cookouts across southern NH are textbook late-season flashpoints.
Solitary wasps — mud daubers, cicada killers, great black wasps — operate on a different provisioning model altogether. They do not feed larvae on demand; instead, a female hunts, paralyzes, and stocks specific prey in a sealed nest cell before the egg is even laid. Mud daubers provision spiders; cicada killers provision cicadas. These wasps are hunting constantly in summer, but they are not hunting you — and they are not the ones crashing your cookout.
Wasp diet and attractants in southern and central New Hampshire
New Hampshire's wasp diet calendar tracks closely with the southern NH colony cycle. Social wasps — northern and European paper wasps in Manchester, Nashua, Concord, Bedford, and surrounding Rockingham, Hillsborough, Merrimack, and Strafford county communities — ramp up protein foraging from colony founding in late April through early summer, then shift hard to sugar as August approaches. The August sugar shift coincides with three NH-specific attractant peaks: first, apple orchards in the Londonderry and Bedford area drop early fruit by late July and August, creating ground-level sugar that draws foragers from a wide radius. Second, cookout and cider season runs through Labor Day weekend and beyond, when open sodas, fruit salads, and grilled meats draw workers that can no longer smell the difference between your watermelon and a rotting apple. Third, NH sugar-shack and artisan-cider operations run into fall, extending the sugar-attractant window. Manchester-area colonies are especially long-lived. NOAA 1991–2020 normals put Manchester's first hard frost at approximately October 19 (50%) to October 29 (80%) — roughly two to three weeks later than Concord (around October 3) and Keene (around October 1). That extended fall window means Manchester, Bedford, Salem, and Hudson homeowners can expect scavenging pressure to continue into mid-to-late October. Solitary wasps in southern NH — mud daubers provisioning barns and shed walls in Amherst and Milford, cicada killers working sandy soil near Derry and Hooksett, great black wasps foraging late-summer goldenrod — are hunting during this same period but are not competing with you for food. Their prey is insects and arachnids, not your picnic.
Species present in NH
- Northern paper wasp (Polistes fuscatus)
- European paper wasp (Polistes dominula)
- Eastern yellowjacket (Vespula maculifrons) — cross-reference /yellowjackets/
- Black-and-yellow mud dauber (Sceliphron caementarium)
- Eastern cicada killer (Sphecius speciosus) — uncommon, near NH northern range limit
- Great black wasp (Sphex pensylvanicus)
Peak activity
August through mid-September (sugar-foraging / human-conflict peak)
Service area
First-frost anchor: Manchester first hard frost ~Oct 19 (50%) / Oct 29 (80%) per NOAA 1991–2020 normals; Concord ~Oct 3; Keene ~Oct 1
UNH Cooperative Extension (Eaton) notes that wasp problems around homes are worst 'in homes and yards that provide plenty of food — dropped fruit, exposed garbage, open recycling bins' — confirming that late-season sugar sources drive the majority of human-wasp conflict in NH.
Wasp diet: the two-food, two-season system
Social wasps run on a two-diet system tied to the colony's annual growth arc. From the queen's spring founding through early summer, the colony's energy goes into raising larvae — and larvae need protein, so workers spend most of their time hunting insects. Once the summer brood pupates, that protein demand drops sharply and the colony's foragers — at their annual peak number — pivot to scavenging sugar for their own fuel. Understanding this switch explains almost every late-summer wasp encounter NH homeowners have.
12-month NH phenology
A light phenology anchored to southern NH explains when the diet shift matters most. The protein-foraging phase runs through the colony's growth window (late April through July); the sugar-scavenging phase peaks in August and September when the colony is largest and natural sugar sources — nectar, sap — compete with abundant human food. Manchester-area colonies run roughly two to three weeks later than Concord and the Lakes Region due to later frost timing, extending the sugar-foraging pressure into late October. For the full 12-month NH wasp activity calendar, see /wasp-species/how-long-do-wasps-live.
Apr
low
Overwintered queens emerge; found starter nests alone; minimal foraging pressure on humans
May
building
Queen hunts protein to feed first larvae; first small nests under eaves and soffits
Jun
building
First workers emerge and take over protein foraging; colony expands; garden pest control underway
Jul
building
Colony grows; protein foraging at full intensity; workers hunting caterpillars and flies
Aug
peak
Larvae pupate; protein demand collapses; colony pivots to sugar scavenging; NH cookouts, orchards, and cider operations attract foragers; human conflict peaks
Sep
peak
Maximum colony size; sugar scavenging continues; new queens and males produced; aggression peaks near nest
Oct
declining
First hard frost (Manchester ~Oct 19–29; Concord ~Oct 3); workers and founding queen die; new mated queens disperse to overwinter; foraging ends
Spring / Summer
Workers hunt caterpillars, sawflies, flies, beetles, and other soft-bodied insects to feed the colony's protein-hungry larvae. This is the phase in which social wasps function as genuine beneficial pest predators — a single colony can suppress thousands of caterpillars and garden pests over the season. Adults simultaneously drink flower nectar and sap for their own carbohydrate energy. Solitary wasps operate on a parallel provisioning track: female mud daubers (Sceliphron caementarium) hunt and paralyze spiders to stock their mud cells; female cicada killers (Sphecius speciosus) paralyze cicadas for their soil burrows. Both solitary provisioning behaviors run through mid-to-late summer and are completely independent of the social-wasp diet cycle.
Late summer / Fall
Once the summer brood pupates — typically late July into August in southern NH — the colony's demand for larval protein drops sharply. Workers now forage almost exclusively for sugar to fuel their own flight: fruit juice from apple drops and cider presses, open sodas and sweetened drinks at NH cookouts, tree sap, honeydew from aphid-colonized trees, and any exposed sweet food or garbage. This is the 'ham or jam' switch described by Prof. Seirian Sumner of UCL: workers that spent May and June hunting insects now spend August and September hovering over your watermelon and paper cup. The colony also reaches its annual peak size in this window, so there are more foragers than at any earlier point in the year, intensifying the human-conflict pressure precisely when outdoor activity in NH is highest.
NH activity calendar
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