The Sting of the Wild by Justin O. Schmidt

Author:Justin O. Schmidt
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
Published: 2016-05-27T16:00:00+00:00

9

TARANTULA HAWKS AND SOLITARY WASPS

I would rather be stung a hundred times by digger wasps

than once by that darling of the philosophers, the honeybee!

—Howard Evans, Wasp Farm, 1973

ELECTRIC. A BOLT OUT OF THE HEAVENS. That is what tarantula hawk stings feel like. The question is not are tarantula hawk stings different from those of other stinging insects, but why and how they are different. “Why” questions present a problem for science, as they suggest some purposeful reason behind the observation, and purposes are not amenable to scientific methods. For the moment, if we ignore that limitation and view the “why” as a catalyst for liberating our minds to generate ideas that explain our observations, then we open the door to understanding. Ideas that flow through the door can then be tested and, with good fortune, lead to understanding.

A good start to searching for the whys of tarantula hawk sting pain is in the biology of tarantula hawks and other “solitary” wasps. Solitary in the sense of wasp biology means lack of sociality, that is, not living in colonies with sisters, brothers, mothers, and growing young. Instead, solitary wasps live a life of the single female who must do everything herself so that her offspring survive and carry on her lineage. Solitary wasps are true single moms. Male wasps do no work whatsoever to assist in producing the next generation. Males only mate with females to provide the necessary sperm; otherwise, they are mostly a nuisance to females in their continuing, amorous courting. In some bees, males actually provide some benefit by guarding the nest entrance and by blocking it with their head to prevent intrusion by parasites or other usurping female bees. These males truly are using their heads. Unlike bees, no solitary wasps share a common nest with other females, and males do not use their heads to protect the fort.

Solitary wasps are generally predators that actively hunt and overpower prey. Bees, however, are vegetarians, sipping nectar or other sweet liquids and munching on pollen from flowers. One peculiar group of bees, the Scaptotrigona, commonly called “vulture bees,” abandoned pollen collecting in preference to scavenging meat from dead animals. These bees are the exception to the vegetarian bee rule. Solitary wasps have their own exceptions to their predation rule. The exceptions are the pollen wasps in the subfamily Masarinae, relatives of the potter wasps, named for their often exquisite pottery vases in which the young are reared. Pollen wasps, as the name suggests, collect pollen to provide for their young instead of prey. They are an example of convergent evolution with bees, as they are not closely related to bees, residing on a different branch of the evolutionary tree of life.

If you are a wasp, solitariness has several disadvantages compared to sociality. No, we are not referring to social life in the sense of human social life—friends, parties, shopping together, shared meals, mutual laughs. We are referring to lacking the advantages of siblings and the community effort to enhance life’s prospects.

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