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Sticker of Pigeon tremex
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Pigeon tremex

Tremex columba
Eats: WoodWasps and hornetsForests and woods6 legs

The pigeon tremex is a big wasp-like insect with yellow and black stripes on its brown body. It has a spike sticking out of its back end. The female uses an extra long tube to drill her eggs right into tree trunks.

Lives in
Eastern and western North America, in woods with old trees
Length
2 to 3 cm (0.79 to 1.2 in)
females are bigger than males
Top speed
about 30 km/h (19 mph)
Flying, estimate
What does it eat?
Its larvae live inside dead and dying trees like beech, elm, maple and oak, and eat the wood as they tunnel.
For real!Photo of Pigeon tremex
Picture by Billmcmillan. CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

How big is it?

How long is it?

Pigeon tremex about 3 cm long (1.2 in)A grain of rice about 6 mm (0.24 in)A toy building brick about 3.2 cm (1.3 in)A crayon about 9 cm (3.5 in)
as long as 5 grains of rice in a rowcould fly across a whole football pitch in 13 secondsmoves 280 times its own body length every second

How big is Pigeon tremex compared to YOU?

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How fast is it?

cool stuff

Fun facts

1

A female puts only two to seven eggs into a tree.

2

After laying her eggs the female dies, and sometimes she stays stuck to the bark.

3

Giant wasps with very long tails can find its larvae deep inside the wood and lay their own eggs next to them.

4

It mostly picks dead trees, so it rarely harms healthy forests.

5

While laying eggs it can spread a fungus that makes the tree rot.

you asked

Most asked questions about Pigeon tremex

?What is the long spike on a pigeon tremex?

The female's long tube is for drilling her eggs into tree trunks.

?How big is a pigeon tremex?

Females are 2.5 to 3 centimetres long, and males are a little smaller.

For bug experts

Scientific name
Tremex columba
Group
Wasps and hornets
Family
Siricidae
Classification
Insecta > Hymenoptera > Siricidae
Lives on
North America
Also known as
Pigeon horntail

Where the facts come from

  1. Tremex columba (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
  2. Picture by Billmcmillan. CC BY-SA 4.0, 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.

More from the same group: Wasps and hornets

Also at home here: Forests and woods