BEWARE THE
CRYPT-KEEPER!
“So nat’ralist
observe, a flea
Has smaller fleas
that on him prey;
And these have
smaller fleas to bite ‘em.
And so proceeds Ad infinitum.”
Jonathan Swift
It will
invade your nightmares, and other living things as well. Meet the Crypt-keeper
(Euderus set) wasp. This insect is named after the
Egyptian God, Set. Set, the god of evil and chaos, trapped his brother, Osiris, in a crypt, killed him
and then cut him into little pieces. It was also believed that Set had control over the minds of other animals, like hyenas and snakes. If you think that’s pretty yucky, then you’ll
find the Crypt-keeper wasp horrific. Keeping all this
morbid stuff in mind, and after you've read this post, I think you’ll agree that the Crypt-keeper wasp has been
well named.
I
usually post about some unusual or endangered animal. However, this newly
discovered insect caught my imagination, and I have to admit that’s just the kind of
stuff that writers enjoy. So, this week’s post will introduce the Crypt-keeper
Wasp. It’s beautiful, and like other many gorgeous things, it’s deadly.
PHOTO CREDIT: Andrew
Forbes/University of Iowa
PHOTO CREDIT: Andrew
Forbes/University of Iowa
It’s the
life cycle of this wasp that is truly diabolical. Discovered in the
southeastern portion of the United States, the Crypt-keeper uses another insect’s
(Gall Wasp) ‘nests,’ or chambers, to lay its eggs. Once the eggs are hatched,
the newly ‘born’ larvae burrow into the body of the Gall Wasp. There it takes
over the mind of the Gall Wasp, forcing it to tunnel through the pulp of the
tree, creating an opening. Tunneling through tree pulp is something that the
Crypt-keeper wasp cannot do on its own. The opening is too small for the Gall
Wasp to escape through, which turns out to be good for the Crypt-keeper because
this is when the Crypt-keeper begins eating the Gall Wasp from the inside out.
In a final diabolic act, the Crypt-keeper creates a hole in the head of the
Gall Wasp and emerges to the outside world.
ILLUSTRATION BY
BOULET
The Gall Wasp in its chamber.
The
Crypt-keeper wasp is an example of what is called a hyperparasite, which means
that it is a parasite that takes advantage of other parasites. Crypt-keeper has
brought parasitic behavior to new heights by taking over the ‘mind’ of its host
and making it do things that would be detrimental to its life. This
mind-bending behavior is called hypermanipulation. Although this discovery has
stunned the world of insect/animal behavior, Andrew Forbes warns that it might
not be so uncommon.
“E. set and its amazing biology
could very easily be incredibly common and we simply hadn’t noticed it until
just now,” notes Andrew Forbes, an evolutionary biologist at the University of
Iowa and study co-author.
To learn
more about this weird and fiendish insect, visit the following sites:
You also
might enjoy this video which comes to us from Rice University where this
unusual wasp is being studied.
Thank
you for stopping by, and please take a moment to share. It’s
appreciated.
Enjoy! Simple
Jeanne E.
Rogers, Award Winning Author
The Sword of
Demelza, The Gift of Sunderland
and
One Hot Mess, A
Child’s Environmental Fable
Where Endangered
Animal Heroes Roam the Pages!
No comments:
Post a Comment