Instruct: Given a question, retrieve relevant documents that answer the question.
Query: Are there bee hunting wasps?
Bearing this in mind, and that each of the superfamilies under discussion includes families other than those listed here, families that are in no way hunting wasps, consider the following, consulting the links and references for detailed discussion of the biology:Although it had long been realised that bees were in essence a natural grouping of wasps that fed primarily on nectar and pollen, it took the development of molecular biology to demonstrate the actual grouping of true bees with the following families of definitive hunting wasps.These cockroach wasps are a popular example of a primitive mode of hunting wasp behaviour; they do not build a secure nest for their prey plus its egg, but conceal it in the most convenient crack or burrow, in which respect their behaviour resembles that of some of the Bethylidae.A very large family with varied habits and a wide range of prey species. Crabronid species in some taxa concentrate on flies, others on bees, others on cicadas, but the overwhelming majority build tunnels, whether single or branched, with one or more larvae inside.These are a widely varied family, including the digger wasps and mud daubersThese are generally large wasps that hunt subterranean insects, usually beetle larvae. Commonly they do little to conceal the paralysed prey, but lay the egg on it underground.Another large and varied family. They include the social wasps such as paper wasps and hornets. These are hunting wasps in the sense that they hunt animal food, generally insects, but they do not subtly paralyse them; instead they more or less butcher them and carry the most nutritious portions back to the colony to feed the young progressively. Other Vespidae include the solitary potter wasps, that are classical examples of hunting wasps of the kind that build their nests out of mud. The Masarinae or pollen wasps are the major exception in the family in that they do not hunt at all, but instead feed their larvae pollen and nectar, as many members of the superfamily Apoidea do.
This is a bird which breeds in sub-tropical semi-desert with a few trees, such as acacia. It winters in open woodland or grassland. As the name suggests, bee-eaters predominantly eat insects, especially bees, wasps and hornets, which are caught in the air by sorties from an open perch. However, this species probably takes more dragonflies than any other food item. Its preferred hunting perch is telephone wires if available.
This bee lives in underground nests, preferably in or around wooden areas and gardens. Nests can be anywhere from 6 inches to a foot below the surface. Tunnels traveling to the nest range from 9 inches to 4 feet long. "B. bimaculatus" can also nest above ground or in cavities. Bees do not build nests and instead rely on finding abandoned rodent dens, hollow logs, suitable man-made structures, or tussocks. Queens will hibernate in loose dirt or rotting logs.
Philanthus gloriosus is a species of bee-hunting wasp found west of the 100th meridian in North America, from Medicine Hat, Alberta south across the High Plains and Rocky Mountains to the Mexican states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Durango, San Luis Potosí, Hidalgo, Mexico City and Puebla.
The largest social wasp is the Asian giant hornet, at up to in length. The various tarantula hawk wasps are of a similar size and can overpower a spider many times its own weight, and move it to its burrow, with a sting that is excruciatingly painful to humans. The solitary giant scoliid, "Megascolia procer", with a wingspan of 11.5 cm, has subspecies in Sumatra and Java; it is a parasitoid of the Atlas beetle "Chalcosoma atlas". The female giant ichneumon wasp "Megarhyssa macrurus" is long including its very long but slender ovipositor which is used for boring into wood and inserting eggs. The smallest wasps are solitary chalcid wasps in the family Mymaridae, including the world's smallest known insect, "Dicopomorpha echmepterygis" (139 micrometres long) and "Kikiki huna" with a body length of only 158 micrometres, the smallest known flying insect.
The waxwings are a group of passerine birds with soft silky plumage and unique red tips to some of the wing feathers. In the Bohemian and cedar waxwings, these tips look like sealing wax and give the group its name. These are arboreal birds of northern forests. They live on insects in summer and berries in winter. Two species have been recorded in Washington.Order: PasseriformesFamily: Ptiliogonatidae
These ants are very common in Europe and live in meadows and gardens. They live on a diet of honeydew excreted by aphids and feed on many types of insect and other invertebrates. They will attack any creature that disturbs their nest, but are not as aggressive as the red imported fire ant. They also consume pollen, a phenomenon rarely documented in ants of the temperate zone.
Mud dauber (or "mud wasp") is a name commonly applied to a number of wasps from either the family Sphecidae or Crabronidae that build their nests from mud. Mud daubers belong to different families and are variable in appearance. Most resemble long, slender wasps about in length. The name refers to the nests that are made by the female wasps, which consist of mud molded into place by the wasp's mandibles. Mud daubers are not normally aggressive, but can become belligerent when threatened. Stings are uncommon.
The organ pipe mud dauber ("Trypoxylon politum") is a predatory wasp in the family Crabronidae. They are fairly large wasps, ranging from 3.9–5.1 mm, and have been recorded to fly from May to September. Female and male are similar in colour, a shiny black with pale yellow to white hind hindtarsomere. The organ pipe mud dauber feeds mainly on three genera of spider: Neoscona, Araneus, and Eustala. Melittobia, a parasitoid wasp, is a common ectoparasite of "T. politum" prepupae. Other sources of parasitism include the Bombyliid fly Anthrax, Chrysidid wasps, and various species of scavenger flies (Miltogramminae). The tufted titmouse ("Parus bicolor") is a known predator of "T. politum", and may feed on them more commonly than previously thought as the holes made by the titmouse are similar in shape and size to those made by T. politum leaving the nest after pupation.
The queen bee's abdomen is longer than the worker bees surrounding her and also longer than a male bee's. Even so, in a hive of 60,000 to 80,000 honey bees, it is often difficult for beekeepers to find the queen with any speed; for this reason, many queens in non-feral colonies are marked with a light daub of paint on their thorax. The paint used does no harm to the queen and makes her much easier to find when necessary.
All three species may occupy the same sites year after year, creating large numbers of nests. Mud dauber nests can last many years in protected locations and are often used as nest sites by other kinds of wasps and bees, as well as other types of insects.
With a mass of approximately and a length of 5 centimetres (2.0 in), the bee hummingbird ("Mellisuga helenae") is the world's smallest bird species and the smallest warm-blooded vertebrate. Called the "zunzún" in its native habitat on Cuba, it is lighter than a Canadian or U.S. penny. It is said that it is "more apt to be mistaken for a bee than a bird". The bee hummingbird eats half its total body mass and drinks eight times its total body mass each day. Its nest is 3 cm across.
Polybia rejecta is a species of social wasp found in the Neotropics region of the world. It was discovered by Fabricius in South America in the 1790s. The wasp is associated with many other organisms, particularly specific species of ants and birds such as the "Azteca" ants and the cacique birds. This association is most beneficial to the ants and birds because of the aggressive protective nature of the wasp. The wasps will protect their nest even if it means death against any predator that approaches it and therefore this means that the association also protects the ants and birds. Additionally, the wasp is known for eating the eggs of red eyed tree frogs as a main way of subsistence. It also, like many other wasp species, has a caste system of queens and workers that is evident by difference in body size among the wasps; the biggest female becomes the queen.
Toxorhynchites, also called elephant mosquito or mosquito eater, is a genus of diurnal and often relatively colorful mosquitoes, found worldwide between about 35° north and 35° south. It includes the largest known species of mosquito, at up to in length and in wingspan. It is among the many kinds of mosquito that do not consume blood. The adults subsist on carbohydrate-rich materials, such as honeydew, or saps and juices from damaged plants, refuse, fruit, and nectar.
Mosquitos belong to the biological Order of Diptera (which includes all two-winged insects), suborder Nematocera, family Culicidea. There are >3,500 different mosquito species with the Aedes and Culex genera being common in North America. It is assumed that any species of mosquito that causes an ordinary mosquito bite reaction in humans is capable of causing MBA. In addition to mosquitoes, the Diptera order includes numerous other types of biting insects such as midges (e.g. sand flies) and gnats. Bites by the latter insects or possibly some other insects may cause reactions that are mechanistically and clinically similar to those seen with mosquito bites.
The blue mud dauber ("Chalybion californicum") is a metallic blue species of mud dauber wasp that is the primary predator of black widow spiders. Females build their own nests, but occasionally refurbish nests abandoned by other mud dauber wasps, particularly "Sceliphron". It is not normally aggressive. It is similar in shape and colour to the steel-blue cricket hunter ("Chlorion aerarium"). Like other types of wasps, males do not have an ovipositor, therefore cannot sting.
The Arctiinae (formerly called the family Arctiidae) are a large and diverse subfamily of moths, with around 11,000 species found all over the world, including 6,000 neotropical species. This group includes the groups commonly known as tiger moths (or tigers), which usually have bright colours, footmen, which are usually much drabber, lichen moths, and wasp moths. Many species have "hairy" caterpillars that are popularly known as woolly bears or woolly worms. The scientific name of this subfamily refers to this hairiness (Gk. αρκτος = a bear). Some species within the Arctiinae have the word “tussock” in their common name due to people misidentifying them as members of the Lymantriinae based on the characteristics of the larvae.
The closest relatives of mantises are the termites and cockroaches (Blattodea), which are all within the superorder Dictyoptera. Mantises are sometimes confused with stick insects (Phasmatodea), other elongated insects such as grasshoppers (Orthoptera), or other unrelated insects with raptorial forelegs such as mantisflies (Mantispidae). Mantises are mostly ambush predators, but a few ground-dwelling species are found actively pursuing their prey. They normally live for about a year. In cooler climates, the adults lay eggs in autumn, then die. The eggs are protected by their hard capsules and hatch in the spring. Females sometimes practice sexual cannibalism, eating their mates after copulation.
Sceliphron is a genus of Hymenoptera of the Sphecidae family of wasps, commonly referred to as mud daubers. They are solitary and build nests made of mud. Nests are frequently constructed in shaded niches, often just inside of windows or vent openings, and it may take a female only a day to construct a cell requiring dozens of trips carrying mud. Females will add new cells one by one to the nest after each cell is provisioned. They provision these nests with spiders, such as crab spiders, orb-weaver spiders and jumping spiders in particular, as food for the developing larvae. Each mud cell contains one egg and is provided with several prey items. Females of some species lay a modest average of 15 eggs over their whole lifespan . Various parasites attack these nests, including several species of cuckoo wasps, primarily by sneaking into the nest while the resident mud dauber is out foraging.
Although the average lifespan of a queen in most subspecies is three to five years, reports from the German-European black bee subspecies previously used for beekeeping indicate that a queen can live up to eight years. Because a queen's store of sperm is depleted near the end of her life, she begins laying more unfertilized eggs; for this reason, beekeepers often replace queens every year or two.
One disadvantage to making nests is that most, if not all, of the nest-maker’s offspring are concentrated in one place, making them highly vulnerable to predation. Once a predator finds a nest, it can plunder it cell by cell. A variety of parasitic wasps, ranging from extremely tiny chalcidoid wasps to larger, bright green chrysidid wasps attack mud dauber nests. They pirate provisions and offspring as food for their own offspring.
Philanthus pulchellus is a species of bee-hunting wasp (or "beewolf") of Spain and adjacent regions of Europe.
The Pacific burrowing wasp ("Philanthus multimaculatus") is a species of bee-hunting wasp — or a "beewolf" — of Western North America.
Philanthus crabroniformis is a species of bee-hunting wasp (or "beewolf") of North America.
These are abundant and tame birds, familiar throughout their range. There have been estimated to be between 60-80 million little bee-eaters. They breed in open country with bushes, preferably near water. Just as the name suggests, bee-eaters predominantly eat insects, especially bees, wasps and hornets, who are caught in the air by sorties from an open perch. This species often hunts from low perches, maybe only a metre or less high. Before eating their meal, a bee-eater removes the sting by repeatedly hitting the insect on a hard surface.