A variety of animals, including frogs, lizards, birds and bats, eat adult wasps or hornets. Mice, rats, weasels, badgers and raccoons also eat wasp larvae.
Although wasps are brightly colored to deter predators and can deliver a painful sting, natural predators still prey on wasps and their larvae. Praying mantis, beetles and dragonflies eat hornets, and some larger wasps prey on smaller or younger wasps. Reptiles and amphibians seldom seek out wasps as food, but eat them when the opportunity arises. Starlings, magpies and blackbirds hunt wasps, while wrens and woodpeckers eat them occasionally. Some mammalian predators attack wasp nests to eat the larvae they contain.
