[intro] it's summer! and there you are, exploringthe great outdoors and suddenly you hear a buzz, see a flash of yellow and blackand--yeah! you've been stung! was it a bee or wasp or a yellow jacket or hornet? if you didn't get a good look at the tiny attacker,you could always try following a home, you know, carefully. because you can learn a lot aboutcertain kinds of stinging insects by looking at their nests. first up you should know that all wasps and bees belong to the hymenoptera order of insects.
and bees actually evolved from wasps sometime around a hundred and thirty million years ago. this probably happened when a solitaryfemale wasp somehow, maybe even accidentally, introduced pollen to herpersonal nest while, bringing insect prey back for her larva. pollen, is full of protein and could havebeen a nutritious food source especially when prey insects were scarce. so,scientists think that some wasps might have started actively collecting pollenand eventually gave up hunting entirely. trading their smooth, elongated bodieswith big mandibles, for bodies that were adapted to collect pollen and mouthparts to slurp up nectar. in other words,
they evolved into the first solitarybees. lots of differences we see between wasps and bees today reflect these foodchoices. whether they nest alone or are social types that live in colonies. somesolitary female wasps just lay eggs in paralyzed pray, but others create a smallnest to store the bodies by reusing holes and wood made by other insects,building it out of mud or digging it into the ground. solitary bees bring backpollen and nectar to a wood or dirt chamber. sometimes lining their nests withdifferent materials depending on the species. for example, mason bees use mud,carpenter bees use saw dust and leaf-
cutter bees, well, you get the picture. they use tiny leaf pieces. but what about thecolonies? those big old nests you see in trees or on the corner your garage? mostsocial wasps, which include yellow jackets and hornets, are in the familyvespidae, and make their nests out of paper. they come in different shapes andsizes depending on what kind of wasp is building. if you're looking at a big umbrellashaped nest, tucked under the eaves of your house and you can see hexagonalcells then, probably that's a home to some paper wasps. if it's a football-shapednest with smooth walls hanging from say, a treebranch, you're probably standing next to
a colony of hornets. if you see a streamof wasps zipping into a hole in the ground or the walls of a building, you're probably watching yellow jacketsduck into their hidden home. each spring, a queen wasp startsconstructing her new colony in her preferred location by gathering woodpulp. scraping her mandibles against things like tree branches, fence posts,and even cardboard boxes. she mixes this pulp with saliva to make a fibery-goothat dries into a solid, paper structure. she'll then lay some eggs that will growinto female workers, who will help expand and defend the nest. most waspcolonies tend to be pretty small. some
paper wasp nests have fewer than ahundred individuals while, some yellow jacket nests hold up to a couplethousand. and aside from the queen these wasps may only live for a few weeks. soespecially in temperate areas their nests really only need to provideshelter for a season's worth of offspring before their abandoned andleft to degrade. everyone dies, besides any fertilized queens, and even theyabandon ship to find a safe place to hibernate for the cold winter beforestarting the whole cycle over again. but social bees in the family apidae, likebumble bees and honey bees, they do things kind of different.
bumble bees still have pretty small nestsholding up to a few hundred bees and they build them in all kinds ofprotected places: abandoned rodent dens thick grass, sheds or in trees. theirqueens operate on yearly cycles as well. hibernating over the winter thenemerging in the spring to gather food. but bees lack the proper mouth parts tomake their hives out of paper so, instead they secrete a durable, waxy substancefrom their abdomens to construct nectar pots and start a small colony. honey beeson the other hand, carefully select the perfect hive location as a group.favoring protected areas like, inside the hollow of tree cavities, within walls orin artificial beekeeper boxes.
honey bee hives are sturdy. constructedout of organized hexagonal honeycomb cells that they used to store honey, pollen and raise larvae. their coloniesare huge, supporting tens of thousands of members, who live up to a couple months.and these hives are built to last through the winter since, these beesstore around 60 pounds of honey for food and huddle together for warmth. so we allknow bees are essential for their role in pollination and you might hate socialwasps for setting up camp in your garage but, they do help tokeep pests insect populations down and their homes are perfectly suited fortheir lifestyles. thanks for watching
this episode of scishow, which is broughtto you in part by audible. right now audible is offering scishow viewers afree 30-day trial membership. check out audible.com / scishow where you canchoose from over a hundred and eighty thousand audio programs and titles. suchas, bees in america: how the honey bee shaped a nation by tammy horn. go toaudible.com / scishow for a free 30-day trial and download your free title today. the science of how and why this happenedisn't entirely settled but, one thing is certain, royal jelly plays a large role. worker bees produce royal jelly from ...
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