Escudo de la República de Colombia Escudo de la República de Colombia
Panel de Accesibilidad

✎ Juan Pablo Rodríguez Malaver

✎ Juan Pablo Rodríguez Malaver

✎ Camilo Alméciga

Social wasp
Polybia emaciataOrinoquia region

  • Generalities
  • Morpho-functionality
  • Lifecycle
  • Distribution

RECORRIDO VIRTUAL POR LA BIODIVERSIDAD DE COLOMBIA
Museo de Historia Natural
Universidad Nacional de Colombia

Social wasp
Polybia emaciata

They build their nest with mud and are very tolerant to human intervention, their aggressiveness is low. They are hunters of many herbivorous insects. In Colombia it has been recorded that they hunt between 6:00 am and 6:30 pm.

Conservation status

Extinct

Extinct in the Wild

Critically Endangered

Endangered

Vulnerable

Near Threatened

Least Concern

Not Evaluated

Data Deficient

Morpho-functionality

Aguijón

At the end of its abdomen it has a stinger through which it injects poison repeatedly if it feels under strong threat.

Jaws

By means of its powerful jaws it can cut different types of food and carry them.

Vuelo

The large muscles of their thorax allow them to fly over 150 m searching for food

Lifecycle

The swarm is made up of several queen wasps, workers and few males. The variation between the number of queens, workers and males is considerable, but it has been determined that the average number in a colony is 23 queens, 326 workers and 24 males. Queens are capable of laying about 20 eggs per period. It is common to see the workers feed the larvae by passing food from mouth to mouth.

Social wasp

Distribution

They are widely distributed in a diversity of habitats in the Neotropics, they are found in countries such as Panama, Peru, Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela, Bolivia, Brazil, and Argentina. They like to build their nest in thin branches of fruit trees, grasslands, and with good food sources.

Distribution area