The living habits of wasps

Hornets are insect groups with social behavior. The species of Echinopteridae usually have no nest and live freely. When laying eggs, the female bees build a mud chamber or choose suitable bamboo tubes to lay eggs. At the same time, they store larvae or spiders of other insects that are stung and anesthetized after catching. One egg in each chamber is sealed separately. The larvae hatched from the eggs eat the stored prey. After pupation and emergence, they bite the nest and fly out.

Other wasps of wasps nest all their lives. There are differences between queen bee, worker bee (or worker bee)(female) and drone in bee colony. Queen bee is the female bee mated and fertilized with drone after autumn of the previous year. They store sperm in seminal vesicle and use it separately in that year. The drone dies soon after mating. When it gets cold, the fertilized female bees leave the nest to find shelter from wind such as wall crack and straw stack, and overwinter in groups. In the spring of the following year, the surviving female bees go out separately to find suitable places to build nests and lay eggs by themselves. The fertilized eggs they lay form female bees, and the unfertilized eggs form drones. Due to the increase of female bees, the hive gradually expands. The female bees are responsible for nesting and rearing larvae. There are three peaks in central China every year. After autumn, the drones in the nest account for about 1/3 of the total number, which is the period when the drones are most abundant in a year.

The wasp usually hibernates at 12~13℃, nests at 16~18℃, overwinters when the temperature drops to 6~10℃ in autumn, most frequently when the temperature is high in spring, pauses at noon in summer, and does not move at night.

Wasps have a habit of liking light. When the wind is above 3, they stop their activities. When the relative temperature is 60~70%, they are most suitable for activities. When it rains, they stop going out. Wasps like sweet substances. Within 500 meters, wasps can clearly identify the direction and return to the nest smoothly. If they exceed 500 meters, they often get lost.

Wasps of the subfamilies Waspiinae and Vespiinae build hives made of paper, not beeswax. It differs from bees and other wasps in this respect.

wasp belongs to complete metamorphosis animal. It goes through four stages in its life: egg, larva, pupa and adult. The appearance of each stage is different. The egg is usually oval, white and smooth. There is one in each nest room. There is a silk handle fixed at the base until the larva hatches. Even if the nest is hung upside down, it will not fall off. The worker bee is responsible for feeding it. When it matures, its body gradually turns from crystal clear to bright yellow. Then it seals a thin cocoon at the mouth of the cave and turns into pupa. After hatching into adults, they emerge from the cocoon. It takes only two to three weeks from egg to emergence.

wasp larvae feed on other insects, especially caterpillars. The wasp larvae feed on other anesthetized insects stored by their parents in the closed nest constructed by their parents. The wasp larvae of other wasps feed on other insects chewed by the adults in the nest. After eating, the larvae often secrete a kind of liquid that the adults like to eat. At the end of the midgut of the larvae, a closed sac is formed by the periphagous membrane, which is not communicated with the excretory hole. The excreta are stored in this sac and are free in the body. After pupation, the sac becomes dry and hard and black, and is removed together with molting.