Spiny leaf gall wasp
Diplolepis polita
The spiny leaf gall wasp is a tiny wasp that makes wild rose leaves grow little round balls with short spikes. These balls are called galls. Its baby lives safely inside one, like a house made of leaf.
Lives in
North America, on wild roses
What does it eat?
The larva grows inside the gall and feeds on the plant from the inside.
How fast is it?
A kid running fast about 13 km/h (8.1 mph)
Spiny leaf gall wasp about 22 km/h (14 mph)
A grown-up on a bike about 25 km/h (16 mph)
A car driving in town about 50 km/h (31 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
The galls appear on rose leaves in spring and early summer.
2
The galls are round with short spikes, a bit like tiny sea urchins.
3
It uses several kinds of wild roses, such as the prairie rose and the prickly rose.
you asked
Most asked questions about Spiny leaf gall wasp
?What is a gall?
A gall is a little lump a plant grows around a gall wasp's egg. The baby wasp lives and eats inside it.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Diplolepis polita
- Named by
- Ashmead, 1890
- Group
- Wasps and hornets
- Family
- Cynipidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Hymenoptera > Cynipidae
- Lives on
- North America
Where the facts come from
- Diplolepis polita (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 Giselle Blythe. CC0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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