Hymenoepimecis argyraphaga
I bet you are thinking – wtf? And I agree. Totally wtf. I don’t know if you hate spiders as much as I do but I learned something today that really makes me thankful to be the dominant species on the planet (other than viruses). First I learned about a spider that is vegetarian who has a symbiotic relationship with “fearsome wasp-like ants”! Then, from that article, I learned about another spider/wasp relationship that is way more horrific. A wasp called the Hymenoepicsekljfklsdjf whatever – the Hymeno-turn-you-into-a-zombie wasp! AHHHHH! Listen to this!
“The adult female wasp temporarily paralyzes the spider and lays an egg on its abdomen. The egg hatches into a larva which sucks the spider’s blood through small holes, while the spider goes on about its normal web building and insect catching behavior for the next one to two weeks. When the larva is ready to pupate, it injects a chemical into the spider, causing it to build a web whose design is completely different from any it has ever made, and then to sit motionless in the middle of this web. The wasp larva then molts, kills the spider with a poison and sucks its body dry before discarding it and building a cocoon that hangs from the middle of the web the spider has just built. The larva pupates inside the cocoon, then emerges to mate and begin the cycle over again.”
OH MY God, I’m freaking out. What if these wasps somehow figure out how to do that to humans one day?! Or worse what if the government figures out what kind of chemical the wasps are using and then uses it on us?! Or what if we do deep space travel eventually and find a planet with giant insects and spiders as the dominant species but then we can’t leave because our spaceship is broken?! I’m never leaving the house again.
jeremy, 
Carmen, 
Emilily and one other person are discussing.
olga 3:45 am on October 14, 2009 Permalink
Don’t worry Carmen, humans have been trying for centuries to get silk to come out their behinds, never works. All we get is poop and it is really difficult to spin a web with that stuff.
Emilily 9:36 am on October 14, 2009 Permalink
Oh no. You listened to the RadioLab podcast on parasites, didn’t you?!?! That wasp thing is soooo disgusting. I seriously worried about the same thing, what if those wasps evolve and can lay their eggs in us?!?! Or what if we someday discover some other insect that has a similar toxin that does have an affect on humans, there could be something like this living in the rainforests right now! And what about the one where the fly larva was growing in that guys scalp and he just left it there? I think they should sell purse-sized cans, just like pepper-spray, of nasty parasitical insect and alien repellent.
Emilily 10:54 am on October 16, 2009 Permalink
That wasp-spider thing was so gross, I had to go find another.
The female wasp of this species, the emerald cockroach wasp or jewel wasp (Ampulex compressa) stings a roach (specificially a Periplaneta americana, Periplaneta australasiae or Nauphoeta rhombifolia) twice, delivering venom into specific ganglia of the roach. She delivers an initial sting to a thoracic ganglion and injects venom to mildly and reversibly paralyze the front legs of the insect. This facilitates the second venomous sting at a carefully chosen spot in the roach’s head ganglia (brain), in the section that controls the escape reflex. As a result of this sting, the roach will first groom extensively, and then become sluggish and fail to show normal escape responses.
The wasp proceeds to chew off half of each of the roach’s antennae. Researchers believe that the Wasp chews off the antenna to replenish fluids or possibly to regulate the amount of venom because too much could kill and too little would let the victim recover before the larva has grown. The wasp, which is too small to carry the roach, then leads the victim to the wasp’s burrow, by pulling one of the roach’s antennae in a manner similar to a leash. Once they reach the burrow, the wasp lays a white egg, about 2 mm long, on the roach’s abdomen.
With its escape reflex disabled, the stung roach will simply rest in the burrow as the wasp’s egg hatches after about three days. The hatched larva feeds for 4–5 days on the exterior of the roach, then chews its way into its abdomen. Over a period of eight days, the wasp larva consumes the roach’s internal organs in an order which guarantees that the roach will stay alive, at least until the larva enters the pupal stage and forms a cocoon inside the roach’s body.
I fully believe that there are people out there right now experimenting with toxins such as these. All we can hope is that they make us to do cool stuff like in Aeon Flux, like construct one of those giant utopian dome cities, or colonize other planets, and none of that gross waspy stuff.
Carmen 11:25 am on October 16, 2009 Permalink
Holy Crap! That is just so wrong! Clearly these wasps need to take an ethics class.
jeremy 9:50 pm on March 17, 2012 Permalink
Ive been seeing these wasps at my house for the last 3 years now. It took me a while to figure out what they were. They look alot like mosquito hawks, and only come out at night. One stung me while driving in my car one night. It felt like an ant bite, not too bad. But it scared the $h*t out of me because it was at night and i didnt know what it was. Theyre originally from Costa Rica from what ive read, but I guess theyve made their way to east texas. Theres quite alot of them on my porch each night. i can see around 20 a night.