Adults feed on nectar or honeydew, or at extrafloral nectaries, while females prey on and provision their nests with a range of insect groups as well as spiders (Araneae). Nesting behaviour is variable: they often nest in pre-existing cavities or in twigs; many are ground nesters; and some construct tubular mud nests. Communal nesting has been recorded for several subfamilies. The female stings and paralyses her prey which she places in cells inside the nest where an egg is then laid in each cell; the developing larva feeds on the paralysed prey. Different subfamilies display specific prey preferences. Pempredonidae prey mostly on Hemiptera (bugs) and Thysanoptera (thrips), Crabroninae are mostly predators of Diptera (flies); Philanthroninae prey on small adult Coleoptera (beetles); Larrinae, the largest subfamily in Australasia, prey mostly on Orthoptera (crickets and grasshoppers) as well as preying mantids, Blattodea (cockroaches) and spiders; while Nyssoninae have a broad prey range including Hemiptera, Diptera, Hymenoptera, Neuroptera and Odonata. The biology and systematics of the Australian nyssonine genus Bembix (sand wasps), with more than 80 species, has been examined in detail.