Mammoth wasp
The mammoth wasp is the biggest wasp in Europe. It looks like a huge, long bumblebee, glossy black and fuzzy, with yellow bands or spots on its back end. The female has a bright yellow head, and the smaller male has a black one.
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Fun facts
The baby wasp eats the whole beetle grub except its skin, then spins a cocoon and comes out the next spring.
It can only live where rhinoceros beetles live too, so it often shows up near compost heaps and manure piles.
In central Europe it flies from June until about the middle of July.
A famous gold jewel made in ancient Crete more than 3000 years ago may show two mammoth wasps.
Most asked questions about Mammoth wasp
?How big is a mammoth wasp?
Females can be about 4,5 centimetres long, and males are smaller.
?What does a mammoth wasp eat?
Adults drink nectar. Their babies eat rhinoceros beetle grubs.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Megascolia maculata
- Named by
- Drury, 1773
- Group
- Wasps and hornets
- Family
- Scoliidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Hymenoptera > Scoliidae
- Lives on
- Europe, Africa, Asia
Where the facts come from
- Regiscolia maculata (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by liesvanrompaey. CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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