Multimedia Gallery
Paper Wasp (Mischocyttarus mastigophorus)
Paper Wasp (Mischocyttarus mastigophorus)
A colony of the social paper wasp (Mischocyttarus mastigophorus), from a cloud forest in Monteverde, Costa Rica.
These wasps build a paper nest consisting of a single open comb. Brood-larvae and eggs are visible in some of the cells of the nest. The queen (the adult wasp at top center) has placed her abdomen in a cell to lay an egg. If you look closely around the nest entrance, you can see (yet another) amazing adaptation to reduce ant predation: the paper and substrate are covered with a fuzz of sticky traps that the wasps have built.
[Funded by National Science Foundation grant IOS 03-47315, awarded to lead principal investigator Sean O'Donnell, University of Washington; "Collaborative Research: Brain Plasticity and Division of Labor- From Simple to Complex Societies," Theresa Jones, co-principal investigator, University of Texas.] [See related Image.] (Date of Image: July 2006)
Credit: Sean O'Donnell, University of Washington
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