A
small but highly efficient killing machine—a hornet two inches long and with a
wingspan up to three inches—lurks in the mountains of Japan.
The voracious predator has a quarter-inch stinger that pumps out a dose of
venom with an enzyme so strong it can dissolve human tissue. About 40
people die each year after being stung by giant hornets, mainly as a result of
an allergic reaction to the venom. They seem brutal to humans but they're just
doing what they have to do to survive. They're excellent mothers and fierce
protectors.
A
film producer, Jeff Morales, said he wanted to give the Japanese giant hornet a
fair hearing. "Hornets get a bad rap for the most part, but they really
are an integral part of a delicate ecosystem," he said. "Social
insects like the hornet are incredibly intriguing animals, and there are so
many things we have yet to discover about their ways."
European
honeybees are a favorite target of the giant hornets. Once an
enterprising hornet scouts out a bee colony, it marks the nest with a type of
bodily chemical substance called a pheromone. Soon, a horde of giant
hornets—each hornet five times larger than a European honeybee—arrives to
decimate the colony.
The
annual cycle of life and death begins anew each spring on the Japanese island
of Honshu.
As the cold weather fades, giant hornet queens awake from six months of
hibernation. Inside, they carry the eggs of those who will be the hive's
workers and soldiers. A hornet queen lays thousands of eggs that take only a
week to develop into larvae. The size of a hornet hive grows quickly as the
season progresses—and so does the ravenous hunger of the young hornets.
The
queen feeds her young at first, but soon an army of hornet hunters is
dispatched to surrounding forests in search of more food sources. The hornets
are highly industrious while their season lasts, relentlessly slaughtering
other insects and building the size of their hives. As cold weather approaches,
the giant hornets' dominance comes to an end. The queens lay unfertilized eggs
that will become the male hornets that are needed to fertilize a new generation
of queens, which in turn hibernate until spring arrives again. Adult hornets
feed their young by chewing the flesh of their victims into a gooey paste that
the offspring devour. The larvae are well fed, and in turn provide the adults
with a powerful energy-boosting cocktail in their saliva.
It's called Vespa amino acid mixture, or VAAM. Regular doses of VAAM from the
larvae give giant hornets their incredible stamina and energy—when pursuing
prey, they can travel a range of 60 miles (96 kilometers) at speeds reaching 25
miles per hour. The incredible effects of VAAM have not gone unnoticed in Japan:
the country's latest sports drink is based on this "hornet power."
Not only have that in Japan’s mountain villages, the hornets are valued as
parted of the basic diet. They are eaten deep fried, or even as hornet sashimi.
Your
Notes
Power
of enzyme in the venom:
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How
Giant hornets attack European honeybees:
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Factors that prove that Giant hornets are social
insects:
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