English

A southern yellowjacket (Vespula squamosa)

Wikispecies

Wikispecies

Alternative forms

• yellow jacket

Noun

yellowjacket ‎(plural yellowjackets)

1. (chiefly US) A predatory wasp with alternating black and yellow stripes around the abdomen, usually of the genera Vespula or Dolichovespula.
   • 2002, Dennis R. Pittenger, California Master Gardener Handbook, page 183,

     Yellowjackets (Vespula spp.) and paper wasps (Polistes spp.) are beneficial insects in that they are predators of house flies and insect pests that damage landscape trees and crops.

   • 2002, Roger D. Akre, Hal C. Reed, 19: Ants, Wasps an Bees (Hymenoptera), Gary R. Mullen, Lance A. Durden (editors), Medical and Veterinary Entomology, page 398,

     The eastern yellowjacket (V. maeulifrons) and the hybrid yellowjacket (V. flavopilosa) are major picnic and campsite pests, especially in the fall in the eastern United States. […] Many people are stung while getting a drink of water from fountains frequented by yellowjackets seeking water.

   • 2007, James H. Hunt, The Evolution of Social Wasps, page 61,

     Vespula and Dolichovespula, collectively called yellowjackets, are broadly distributed in subarctic and temperate zones of the Northern Hemisphere, extending no farther into the tropics than high elevations at the temperate/tropical boundary (Hunt et al. 2001a). […] The wasp in your summertime can of soda or beer is a yellowjacket.

   • 2010, Ray Schar, Wonderfully Weird World, page 33,

     Rotting fruit lying on the ground in the back yard are drawing yellowjackets, got to get rid of them before one of the dogs get stung.