Beetle Infiltrates Ant Colonies, Pretends to Be Queen. "The ant colony is a heavily guarded, nearly impenetrable fortress rich with bountiful resources.
Intruders attempting to infiltrate the ant society are immediately discovered via chemical cues, overtaken and dismantled. Nothing gets by, except for the few highly specialized, that have evolved the necessary chemical, morphological and behavioural tools to hack the complex recognition and communication system of the ants. Flying under the ant radar represents a huge boon that not only grants free access to the bounty of the colony—including the ants themselves—but further provides a safe and well-protected harbor to develop and live.
" University Roma Tre's Professor Andrea Di Giulio and his team of co-authors set the scene remarkably well in their paper recently published to PLoS ONE. The focus of that paper? First, the beetles secrete chemicals that mimic those produced by ants, allowing them to blend in. The Pied Piper: A Parasitic Beetle’s Melodies Modulate Ant Behaviours. Abstract Ants use various communication channels to regulate their social organisation.
The main channel that drives almost all the ants’ activities and behaviours is the chemical one, but it is long acknowledged that the acoustic channel also plays an important role. However, very little is known regarding exploitation of the acoustical channel by myrmecophile parasites to infiltrate the ant society. Among social parasites, the ant nest beetles (Paussus) are obligate myrmecophiles able to move throughout the colony at will and prey on the ants, surprisingly never eliciting aggression from the colonies. It has been recently postulated that stridulatory organs in Paussus might be evolved as an acoustic mechanism to interact with ants. Citation: Di Giulio A, Maurizi E, Barbero F, Sala M, Fattorini S, Balletto E, et al. (2015) The Pied Piper: A Parasitic Beetle’s Melodies Modulate Ant Behaviours. Editor: Fabio S. Received: March 21, 2015; Accepted: May 21, 2015; Published: July 8, 2015. Wasp Wednesday: Great Black Wasp. Few North American wasps are as conspicuous as the Great Black Wasp, Sphex pensylvanicus.
This all-black insect with violet reflections on its wings is so large as to sometimes be mistaken for a tarantula hawk wasp. Males average 22 millimeters in body length, while females are about 28 millimeters (up to 35 mm) and more robust. This is also a common and widespread species, ranging from southeast Canada to northern Mexico, and as far west as southern California. It is absent from the Pacific Northwest, and while I lived in Arizona for a decade, I did not encounter this species there, either. It is perhaps most abundant along forest edges in deciduous woodlands, sumac thickets, gardens, and fields with scattered trees. Habitat preference is governed by the need for the adult wasps to find flower nectar to fuel their flight; and for females to find katydid prey.
Though they are solitary, several females may nest in close proximity to one other. Greater Angle-wing Katydid female. Wasp Wednesday: Great Black Wasp. Field Station - Great Black Wasp. Salutations, BugFans, This is one serious wasp.
At almost 1 ½” long (males are smaller), she gets your full attention when she’s browsing a nearby flower top. The Great Black Wasp (GBW) is decorated at one end by heavy-duty mandibles that allow her to hang onto her prey and, toward the other end, by a narrow constriction/stalk at the top of a stinger-tipped abdomen. She is a semi-gloss black, her legs are aggressively spiny, and she often folds her wings flat over her abdomen. She is also called the Katydid Hunter and Steel-blue Cricket Hunter (the latter name is shared with a smaller wasp species) and is one of a family of solitary, hunting wasps.
Four nifty things about GBWs: territoriality; tool-using, John Bartram, and kleptoparasitism. Solitary wasps make egg chambers and provision them with meals for their soon-to-be-offspring. GBWs dig tunnels in soft soil. After an egg hatches, the larva spends about 10 days raiding the pantry and then pupates in the tunnel through the winter.