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| {{alternateuses}} | |||
| {{Cleanup|date=July 2007}} | |||
| {{Unreferenced|date=June 2008}} | |||
| {{Taxobox | |||
| | name = Wasp | |||
| | image = Aleiodes indiscretus wasp parasitizing gypsy moth caterpillar.jpg | |||
| | image_width = 180px | |||
| | image_caption = '']''<br>] a ] caterpillar | |||
| | regnum = ]ia | |||
| | phylum = ]a | |||
| | classis = ]a | |||
| | ordo = ] | |||
| | subdivision_ranks = Suborder | |||
| | subdivision = | |||
| ]<br/> | |||
| See text for explanation. | |||
| }} | |||
| ], with droplet of ]|right]] | |||
| A '''wasp''' is any ] of the order ] and suborder ] that is neither a ] nor ]. The suborder ], known commonly as ], differ from members of Apocrita by having a broader connection between the ] and ]. In addition to this, Symphyta ]e are mostly ] and "]like", whereas those of Apocrita are largely ] or "parasitic" (technically known as ]). | |||
| The most familiar wasps belong to ], a ''division'' of Apocrita, whose ]s are adapted into a ]ous ], though a great many species do not sting. Aculeata also contains ants and bees, and many wasps are commonly mistaken for bees, and vice-versa. In a similar respect, insects called "velvet ants" (the family ]) are technically wasps. | |||
| A much narrower and simpler but popular definition of the term wasp is any member of the aculeate family ]ae, which includes (among others) the genera known in ] as ]s (''Vespula'' and ''Dolichovespula'') and ]s (''Vespa''); in many countries outside of the ], the vernacular usage of wasp is even further restricted to apply strictly to ]s (e.g., the "]"). | |||
| ==Categorization== | |||
| The various ] of wasp fall into one of two main categories: solitary wasps and social wasps. Adult solitary wasps generally live and operate alone, and most do not construct nests (below); all adult solitary wasps are fertile. By contrast, social wasps exist in colonies numbering up to several thousand strong and build nests—but in some cases not all of the colony can reproduce. In the more advanced species, just the wasp queen and male wasps can mate, whilst the majority of the colony is made up of sterile female workers. | |||
| ==Characteristics== | |||
| <imagemap> | |||
| Image:Wasp_morphology.png|thumb|250px|The basic morphology of a female Yellowjacket wasp|right | |||
| poly 1011 964 642 889 891 517 1192 1 1603 28 1595 28 1231 821 ] | |||
| rect 80 1066 347 1582 ] | |||
| rect 524 946 963 1352 ] | |||
| poly 365 1599 363 1471 554 1361 966 1373 1340 1438 1757 1618 1742 1809 1340 1806 1015 1597 ] | |||
| rect 353 876 508 1358 ] | |||
| poly 1511 1478 1660 1319 1784 1578 ] | |||
| poly 980 1348 991 1005 1207 892 1643 1286 1494 1474 1214 1384 ] | |||
| rect 0 0 1896 1815 ] | |||
| desc bottom-left | |||
| </imagemap> | |||
| The following characteristics are present in most wasps: | |||
| * two pairs of ] (except wingless or brachypterous forms in all female ], ], many male ], many female ], ], ], ], ], ], and various other families). | |||
| * An ], or ] (which is only present in females because it derives from the ovipositor, a female sex organ). | |||
| * Few or no thickened ]s (in contrast to bees); except Mutillidae, Bradynobaenidae, ]. | |||
| * Nearly all wasps are terrestrial; only a few specialized parasitic groups are aquatic. | |||
| * ]s or ]s, mostly on other terrestrial insects; most species of ] (e.g. ]s), specialize in using ]s as prey, and various ]s use spiders or other arachnids as reproductive hosts. | |||
| Wasps are critically important in natural ]. Almost every pest insect species has at least one wasp species that is a predator or parasite upon it. Parasitic wasps are also increasingly used in agricultural ] as they have little impact on crops. Wasps also constitute an important part of the ]. | |||
| ==Biology== | |||
| ===Genetics=== | |||
| In wasps, as in other ], ]es are significantly ] different. Females have a ] (2n) number of ]s and come about from fertilized eggs. Males, in contrast, have a ] (n) number of chromosomes and develop from an unfertilized egg. Wasps store sperm inside their body and control its release for each individual egg as it is laid; if a female wishes to produce a male egg, she simply lays the egg without fertilizing it. Therefore, under most conditions in most species, wasps have complete voluntary control over the sex of their offspring. | |||
| ===Anatomy and gender=== | |||
| ] (simple eyes) and ] part of the ]s; also showing fine, unbranched hairs]] | |||
| Anatomically, there is a great deal of variation between different species of wasp. Like all insects, wasps have a hard ] covering their 3 main body parts. These parts are known as the ], ] and ]. Wasps also have a constricted region joining the first and second segments of the abdomen (the first segment is part of the mesosoma, the second is part of the metasoma) known as the ]. Like all insects, wasps have 3 sets of 2 legs. In addition to their ], wasps also have several simple eyes known as ]. These are typically arranged in a triangular formation just forward of an area of the head known as the ]. | |||
| It is possible to distinguish between certain wasp species genders based on the number of divisions on their ]. Male Yellowjacket wasps for example have 13 divisions per antenna, while females have 12. Males can in some cases be differentiated from females by virtue of the fact that the upper region of the male's mesosoma (called the ''tergum'') consists of an additional terga. The total number of terga is typically 6. The difference between sterile female worker wasps and queens also varies between species but generally the queen is noticeably larger than both males and other females. | |||
| ] ('']'', family ]) removing body fluids from a fly after having paralysed it with the sting ]] | |||
| Wasps can be differentiated from bees as bees have a flattened hind ]. Unlike bees, wasps generally lack plumose hairs. They vary in the number and size of hairs they have between species. | |||
| ===Diet=== | |||
| ] wasp|right]] | |||
| Generally wasps are ]s or ]s as larvae, and feed only on nectar as adults. Many wasps are predatory, using other insects (often paralyzed) as food for their larvae. A few social wasps are omnivorous, feeding on a variety of fallen fruit, nectar, and carrion. Some of these social wasps, such as yellowjackets, may scavenge for dead insects to provide for their young. In many social species the larvae provide sweet secretions that are fed to the adults. | |||
| In parasitic species, the first meals are almost always provided by the animal that the adult wasp used as a host for its young. Adult male wasps sometimes visit flowers to obtain ] to feed on in much the same manner as ]. Occasionally, some species, such as ]s, invade ] nests and steal ] and/or ].{{Fact|date=March 2007}} | |||
| ==Wasp parasitism== | |||
| ]|right]] | |||
| With most species, adult ]s themselves do not take any ] from their prey, and, much like ], ], and ]s, those that do feed as adults typically derive all of their nutrition from nectar. Parasitic wasps are typically ]s, and extremely diverse in habits, many laying their eggs in inert stages of their host (] or ]), or sometimes paralyzing their prey by injecting it with venom through their ]. They then insert one or more eggs into the host or deposit them upon the host externally. The host remains alive until the parasitoid ] are mature, usually dying either when the ]s ], or when they emerge as adults. | |||
| ==Nesting habits== | |||
| ] | |||
| The type of nest produced by wasps can depend on the species and location. Many social wasps produce paper pulp nests on trees, in attics, holes in the ground or other such sheltered areas with access to the outdoors. By contrast solitary wasps are generally parasitic or predatory and only the latter build nests at all. Unlike ]s, wasps have no ] producing ]. Many instead create a paper-like substance primarily from wood pulp. Wood fibers are gathered locally from weathered wood, softened by chewing and mixing with saliva. The pulp is then used to make combs with cells for brood rearing. More commonly, nests are simply burrows excavated in a substrate (usually the soil, but also plant stems), or, if constructed, they are constructed from mud. | |||
| ===Solitary wasps=== | |||
| ] wasp from ]|right]] | |||
| The nesting habits of solitary wasps are more diverse than those of social wasps. ]s and ]s construct mud cells in sheltered places typically on the side of walls. ]s similarly build vase-like nests from mud, often with multiple cells, attached to the twigs of trees or against walls. Most other predatory wasps burrow into soil or into plant stems, and a few do not build nests at all and prefer naturally occurring cavities, such as small holes in wood. A single egg is laid in each cell, which is sealed thereafter, so there is no interaction between the larvae and the adults, unlike in social wasps. In some species, male eggs are selectively placed on smaller prey, leading to males being generally smaller than females. | |||
| ] | |||
| ===Social wasps=== | |||
| The nests of some social wasps, such as hornets, are first constructed by the queen and reach about the size of a walnut before sterile female workers take over construction. The queen initially starts the nest by making a single layer or canopy and working outwards until she reaches the edges of the cavity. Beneath the canopy she constructs a stalk to which she can attach several cells; these cells are where the first eggs will be laid. The queen then continues to work outwards to the edges of the cavity after which she adds another tier. This process is repeated, each time adding a new tier until eventually enough female workers have been born and matured to take over construction of the nest leaving the queen to focus on reproduction. For this reason, the size of a nest is generally a good indicator of approximately how many female workers there are in the colony. Social wasp colonies often have populations exceeding several thousand female workers and at least one queen. '']'' and some related types of paper wasp do not construct their nests in tiers but rather in flat single combs. | |||
| ==Social wasp reproductive cycle (] species only)== | |||
| ] | |||
| Wasps do not reproduce via mating flights like bees. Instead social wasps reproduce between a fertile queen and male wasp; in some cases queens may be fertilized by the sperm of several males. After successfully mating, the male's ] are stored in a tightly packed ball inside the queen. The sperm cells are kept stored in a dormant state until they are needed the following spring. At a certain time of the year (often around autumn), the bulk of the wasp colony dies away, leaving only the young mated queens alive. During this time they leave the nest and find a suitable area to ] for the winter. | |||
| ===First stage=== | |||
| After emerging from hibernation during early spring, the young queens search for a suitable nesting site. Upon finding an area for their future colony, the queen constructs a basic paper fiber nest roughly the size of a walnut into which she will begin to lay ]. | |||
| ===Second stage=== | |||
| The sperm that was stored earlier and kept dormant over winter is now used to ] the eggs being laid. The storage of sperm inside the female queen allows her to lay a considerable number of fertilized eggs without the need for repeated ] with a male wasp. For this reason a single female queen is capable of building an entire colony from only herself. The queen initially raises the first several sets of wasp eggs until enough sterile female workers exist to maintain the offspring without her assistance. All of the eggs produced at this time are sterile female workers who will begin to construct a more elaborate nest around their queen as they grow in number. | |||
| ===Third stage=== | |||
| ]'') evaporating water from a regurgitated droplet to cool itself]] | |||
| By this time the nest size has expanded considerably and now numbers between several hundred and several thousand wasps. Towards the end of the summer, the queen begins to run out of stored sperm to fertilize more eggs. These eggs develop into ] males and fertile female queens. The male drones then fly out of the nest and find a mate thus perpetuating the wasp ]. In most species of social wasp the young queens mate in the vicinity of their home nest and do not travel like their male counterparts do. The young queens will then leave the colony to hibernate for the winter once the other worker wasps and founder queen have started to die off. After successfully mating with a young queen, the male drones die off as well. Generally, young queens and drones from the same nest do not mate with each other; this ensures more ] within wasp populations, especially considering that all members of the colony are theoretically the direct genetic descendants of the founder queen and a single male drone. In practice, however, colonies can sometimes consist of the offspring of several male drones. Wasp queens generally (but not always) create new nests each year, probably because the weak construction of most nests render them uninhabitable after the winter. | |||
| Unlike most honey bee queens, wasp queens typically live for only one year (although exceptions are possible). Also, contrary to popular belief queen wasps do not organize their colony or have any raised status and ] power within the social structure. They are more simply the reproductive element of the colony and the initial builder of the nest in those species which construct nests. | |||
| ==Social wasp caste structure== | |||
| Not all social wasps have castes that are physically different in size and structure. In many ]s and ], for example, the castes of females are determined behaviorally, through dominance interactions, rather than having caste predetermined. All female wasps are ''potentially'' capable of becoming a colony's queen and this process is often determined by which female successfully lays eggs first and begins construction of the nest. Evidence suggests that females compete amongst each other by eating the eggs of other rival females. The queen may, in some cases, simply be the female that can eat the largest volume of eggs while ensuring that her own eggs survive (often achieved by laying the most). This process theoretically determines the strongest and most reproductively capable female and selects her as the queen. Once the first eggs have hatched, the subordinate females stop laying eggs and instead forage for the new queen and feed the young; that is, the competition largely ends, with the losers becoming workers, though if the dominant female dies, a new hierarchy may be established with a former "worker" acting as the replacement queen. Polistine nests are considerably smaller than many other social wasp nests, typically housing only around 250 wasps, compared to the several thousand common with yellowjackets, and stenogastrines have the smallest colonies of all, rarely with more than a dozen wasps in a mature colony. | |||
| ==Common families== | |||
| * ] - ]s | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ] - ]s | |||
| * ] - sand wasps and relatives, e.g. the ] | |||
| * ] - ]s | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ], and ] | |||
| * ] - ] | |||
| * ] - ] | |||
| * ] - ]s | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ] - ]s | |||
| * ] - ]s | |||
| * ] - ]s | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ]ae - ]s, ]s, ]s (umbrella), ]s, ]s | |||
| ==See also== | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ]s, bird predators of wasps | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ]s, a common group of wasps | |||
| * ]s, a diverse group of wasps | |||
| * ] | |||
| * ] | |||
| * '']'' | |||
| * ] | |||
| ==External links== | |||
| {{commons}} | |||
| * | |||
| * contrasting the groups discussed in this article | |||
| * ] - Insect bites and stings, and a section regarding how to prevent them (prevention) | |||
| * {{DermNet|arthropods/bites}} | |||
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