Common Name: Parasitic Flutter Wasp

Scientific Name: Ampulex volitartio

Specimen Length: 84mm

Specimen Sex: Female

First Described: AD 2137

Description and Habitat: Ampulex volitartio is a recently discovered species of super-insect, being in constant evolutionary flux due to its ability to change at an extremely fast rate. Currently it has a single eye-bed, a bulbous protrusion covered by many eyes, each made up of hundreds of light-sensing structures called ommatidia. Rather than antennae, on either side of the upper thorax there are stands of setae. Although their primary function is as a substrate from which pheromones are both dispersed and detected by the many tiny sensors along its lengths during courtship, the setae also act as a means of limited flight, causing this interesting insect to move along in fluttering jumps, inspiring its common name: Parasitic Flutter Wasp.

Reproduction: A direct descendant of the Jewel Wasp, A. volitartio is also an endoparasitoid of the common cockroach, its enslavement a major part of their reproduction strategy. Often just a fraction of the size of her victim, this dangerous wasp begins attacking a cockroach by fluttering above whilst aiming its right stinger at its prey’s thorax, injecting venomous compounds that paralyze the cockroach temporarily so the wasp can aim her next sting with more accuracy into areas of the ganglia, thereby entering its central nervous system. This elicits a long-term behaviour modification termed hypokinesia, turning stung cockroaches into lethargic and compliant (but not completely paralyzed) hosts, a living food supply for the wasp’s offspring, as well as transportation devise and guardian.

Once the female wasp has found a suitable burrow, the roach curiously allows the wasp to mount its head before taking her to the new den. There she will use the left stinger, but this time to oviposit a single egg into the host, which must be large enough to serve as its food source throughout the offspring’s development. She will then leave, knowing the roach will not only stay there until her young has fully developed, but defend the den from other predators whilst being eaten from the inside out. How the neurotoxins instigate this type of defensive behaviour is still not fully understood. The larvae develop through three instar stages, consuming internal tissues selectively, including body fat and skeletal muscle, but sparing the gut and Malpighian tubules so as to postpone death until the new wasp emerges. The developmental timing to pupation is similar between males and females, but cocoon volume and mass, and pupation duration are sexually dimorphic dictating sex before eclosion. Only the females produce venom.

Life Span: Similar to cockroaches, currently approx. 18 months.

NB: It is thought the initial evolution of Flutter Wasps was slow to progress until cockroaches themselves had a sudden burst in population numbers at the end of the 21st century, when its natural predators (amphibians like toads/frogs, and small mammals such as mice/shrews) and most other insect species populations crashed. Now that cockroach numbers have become swarm-sized worldwide, Ampulex volitartio numbers have also increased alongside, although it remains to be seen if its parasitic nursery strategy will still be effective, as the cockroach’s ever growth in size (currently up to 9.7cm in length with a wingspan of up to 20cm) evolves to accommodate the changing chemical makeup in the air supply and environmental conditions.