The differences between their behaviors, outlined in the latest issue of Current Biology, were striking. To put it mildly, female wasps aren't partial to strangers. "The unfamiliar wasps fight," Sheehan described. "One of them snaps its mandibles a lot at one and eventually, at the end, bites the (other's) leg and pulls the wasp across the container." When two familiarized wasps meet again, "they just hang out next to each other grooming themselves." As for male paper wasps, they "all have the same faces," Sheehan said. "It is unlikely that they can tell individual males apart. Males don't really need to know particular individuals since they don't compete or fight with the other members of their nest the way females do." Since females share nests, remembering whom they've settled differences with makes for a more harmonious home life and keeps them from wasting energy on repeated scuffles. Anna Dornhaus, assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Arizona, told Discovery News that the discovery that wasps remember social encounters "is a great finding, although I am not too surprised." "Insects are often supposed to be simple, genetically predetermined behaviorally, but many studies show that this is not at all the case," she explained. "Insects, especially bees, wasps and ants, have been shown to have extraordinary learning skills, and their social environment is very important to them." Related Links: |
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