Video:

Caption: A queen paper wasp (Polistes carnifex) engages in rhythmic antennal drumming while feeding developing larvae in a nest in Guanacaste, Costa Rica, in 2004. A microphone is visible in the upper left. In a study in the Feb. 8, 2011, issue of Current Biology, UW-Madison entomologists Robert Jeanne and Sainath Suryanarayanan and John Hermanson of the USDA Forest Products Laboratory provide evidence that antennal drumming in a related wasp in Wisconsin influences whether the larvae develop into workers or future queens.
Video: courtesy Sainath Suryanarayanan, UW-Madison
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Caption: A queen paper wasp (Polistes fuscatus) perches atop her nest in the University of Wisconsin-Madison Arboretum in 2006. Eggs and water droplets are visible in the nest cells. Research from UW-Madison entomologists Robert Jeanne and Sainath Suryanarayanan and John Hermanson of the USDA Forest Products Laboratory shows that the rhythmic antennal drumming these wasps engage in while feeding developing larvae influences whether the larvae develop into workers or future queens.
Photo: courtesy Sainath Suryanarayanan
Date: 2006
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