We humans have an innate fear of black and yellow striped things that buzz. The paper wasp loves cabbage caterpillars.
Photograph by Artur Rydzewski via Flickr.
The vast majority of wasps aren’t aggressive and territorial.
Q: People have an innate fear of flying insects.
Wasps are amazing for many reasons Most solitary predatory wasps have some degree of prey specialization.
The wasp female not only needs to know where to find her specific prey for example a wood boring beetle belonging to a particular family that has a handful of host trees she needs to also successfully transport the prey back to her nest.
Many predatory wasps hunt prey that is similar or smaller in size to them and usually the prey can be flown back to the nest...
...clutched beneath the wasp But first she must sting the prey and the venom injected into the prey causes paralysis.
This makes the prey easier to transport ensures that the prey won t escape and remains alive long enough for her offspring to consume it.
This is another reason why solitary wasps don t want to use their valuable venom stinging humans they need to capture and subdue multiple prey in their lifetime to ensure that they're providing enough larder food for their offspring.
Q: If there were no wasps, what would the world look like?
The paperback version of Heather’s book on wasps will be available next month.
Q: Are there any ways to deter wasps from nesting near a highly trafficked site? When the nests are small (with few occupants), they can usually be safely removed by mechanical means.
One species, Oxybelus uniglumis, has a really unusual way it carries its prey back to the nest: When the female stings a fly to immobilize it, she leaves her sting impaled in the prey then flies back to the nest with the fly attached to her sting(er)!”