Posted on 06/22/2011 12:07:18 AM PDT by nickcarraway
If a ladybug's life were a horror film, this is how it would start: Scary string music. A close-up of the green-eyed face of a wasp. The sudden pierce of a stinger. The screen goes dark.
Next, an establishing shot of our ladybug hero, sitting placidly on a leaf. Suddenly, the sky clouds over. Something orange and grubby begins to poke from the ladybug's abdomen. Audience members cover their eyes, expecting a quick, gruesome end for the black-and-red insect. But it's not that easy. Instead of dying, the ladybug survives as a wasp larva emerges from its abdomen and begins to weave a cocoon between the ladybug's legs. That's right: The ladybug is a zombie.
This sordid tale isn't fiction for many ladybugs that fall victim to the parasitical wasp Dinocampus coccinellae. Now, a new study reveals why the wasps use ladybugs as incubators. It turns out that the zombie ladybugs keep predators away from the wasps' vulnerable larva, increasing the likelihood that they survive to become full-fledged wasps.
The research, published today (June 21) in the journal Biology Letters, finds that this protection comes at a cost: Larva that cocoon themselves to a living ladybug, as opposed to a dead one or to none at all, can expect fewer eggs of their own when they emerge as wasps. This suggests that the same resources the wasps use to develop their eggs are also used to control the zombie ladybug.
Ladybug horror
The wasps' parasitical ways have been long noticed, and they aren't unique in the insect world. The parasitic wasp Hymenoepimecis argyraphaga, for example, lays its eggs in the spider Plesiometa argyra. The larvae then eat their way out of their host.
Nor is mind control very extraordinary for parasites. Before it dies, an infected P. argyra spider is compelled
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Great, at 3am. Groooooss
That explains the Obama win.
/johnny
Ping
Here in northern Illinois, we have some kind of mutant ladybug that will bite like a biting fly if it lands on you.
IIRC, Ridley Scott based part of the lifecycle in Alien on that particular wasp (i.e. the whole "chestburster" thing).
That sounds like the Asian Lady Beetle or “Japanese ladybug.” Some varieties look almost identical to domestic ladybugs, but they’re a lot more aggressive (thus the bite). Some versions are supposed to have a stink-juice defense, too.
Tarantula wasps give me the willies for same reason.
I ran afoul of some little green shield shaped bugs in Eastern Montana that bit—and it burned when they did. I never found out what they were, but it was pretty unpleasant.
The Ladybugs are NOTHING. You have GOT to see the ZOMBIE ANTS INFECTED BY A FUNGUS WHICH MAKES THEM CLING TO A LEAF AND THEN SHOOTS OUT OF THEIR BRAINS!
That explains the Democratic Party.
I had a Monarch caterpillar I watched get “stung” by a little wasp. Weeks later when the caterpillar went to make a chrysalis, a little white worm burst out of it’s body, crawled across my desk and fell on the floor. I was about 10 at the time and horrified.
OMG...this is horrible!
I *love* lady bugs.
:(
I think our revulsion at bugs like this shows that God made us for better things and a better place.
“the ladybug survives as a wasp larva emerges from its abdomen and begins to weave a cocoon between the ladybug’s legs. That’s right: The ladybug is a zombie. “
Etymological metaphor for the welfare class and taxpayers.
Damn spell checker!
Edit: Entomological
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