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Index of Subjects > Do you mean they eat the nest material & recycle it, or, they eat the eggs and larva & then re-locate? Regardless, this is very interesting! Wonder if other social insects that build these community type nests, do this too. > > Gayle MacLean > Dartmouth Well, A number of social insects are able to relocate their nests and what is in them, but I am sure that the waps in question -lets call them paperwasps- are not able to do this. In wasps and bumblebees only mated queens, that hatched during the summer will hibernate and start from scratch the following year. All others, workers and the queen mom will die latest when the first frost hits. In contrast to this ant and honey bee species form permanent states, and in those a strong population of workers will hibernate with the queen(s). The new queens of the year will have their own collonies formed by the time winter comes (bees, most ants). For the collonies survival stockpiling supplies during the summer (i.e. honey in bees) is mandatory. To allow for efficient foraging these groups have a sophisticated communication system based on chemicals (pheromones) and behaviour (dance language of bees). In paperwasps part of this communication system is present (alarm pheromones for nest defence), other parts of it like recruitment of enst mates for foraging and guiding nestmates to distant locations is not. In wasps every wasp goes out on her own to bring food for feeding the larvae in the nest, and there it goes from the door to the mouth, i.e. no stockpiling of supplies. If you feel bothered by wasps during a picnic be glad they don't talk to each other like honey bees. If a beekeeper doesn't pay attention and leaves a box with honey combs where it can be found by scouts the place will be swarming with 1000s of bees in no time to reclaim the lost treasure. In ants and bees the same communication mechanisms used to inform and guide nestmates to food sources is used during nest relocation. Scouts find suitable locations and direct the whole family by setting chemical trails (ants) or dance (bee, but here pheromones are involved in close range orientation. Comparing different ant species is interesting, since we can find here species with little more communication than wasps and some that broadcast information like honeybees. Ants will move everything (food, eggs, larvae, pupae), bees just the food supplies (honey). Reason for this? Ants rear their offspring in simple cavities -not much prep work required-, while bees need the elaborate honey comb structures to do this. Those have to be rebuild in the new location as bees will leave the honey combs, made of wax = fat= energy rich, behind and rebuilt from scratch. Compared with wax the wooden base used by wasps has no energy value. Like most animals they can not digest it. So even if they would be able to relocate they would likely leave the furniture behind. Now why do we find prematurely abandoned, mostly still intact wasp nests? Predation by other wasps is one possible cause that was already mentioned, but ants are another very possible -and powerful- reason. Kill the queen and the war is won! Ulli
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