The Harlequin Wasp

What a frightening, beautiful beast. During my tangential study of entomology last summer, my friend Jonathan and I caught this spectacle at Salado Creek Park in San Antonio, Texas.

It was so beautiful, we mounted it for his girlfriend as a present. We used half a lava lamp for the base and a modified water bottle for the "terrarium." I, for one, found it clever ^_^

By the way, she friggin' loved it.

Tells you a little bit about his girlfriend.

Tells you a little bit about us.

Onto the wasp.

It's actually called a Tarantula Hawk. How frightening is that? So what does it do, this iridescent turquoise-and-orange beast? It stings tarantulas, paralyzes them, then drags them to an underground lair, wherein the wasp lays its eggs on the still-living tarantula. The babies hatch, and huzzah! A free, warm, living meal.

I called it the Harlequin Wasp preliminarily. Cuz the thing needed a superior, elegant name ^_^

Rawr!

Category:

Pets & Animals

Tags:

• Tarantula
• hawk
• wasp
• turquoise
• terrarium
• mounted
• orange
• wings
• pinning
• pin
• girlfriend
• jonathan
• creepy
• elegant
• awesome

[ticijev]

wow! cool insect :) the description is interesting, but I still can't figure out how big the wasp is. well, how big is it? in centimeters please :D cheers!

[UndeadKangaroo]

I'd say it would fit quite perfectly on a large American silver dollar, or if that description doesn't do anything for you, the palm of a child's hand, as creepy as that might be ;-)

[starscream70]

wooooooow