Insect in the spotlight: Agenioideus nigricornis

Australians have a tiny wasp to thank for keeping the population of a dangerous spider in check. The redback spider hunting wasp (Agenioideus nigricornis) attacks...wait for it...redback spiders. Bites by redback spiders, which are closely related to black widows, cause severe pain, sweating, weakness, vomiting, and in rare cases can result in death.

A redback spider-hunting wasp dragging its paralyzed prey back to its nest. Photo by Florian and Peter Irwin.

The wasp, described in 1775, had only been known by it's scientific name until just recently when a 9 year old boy (budding entomologist perhaps??) observed a wasp dragging a redback spider to it's nest. The boy's father photographed the event, collected the organisms and sent them off to be analysed. The wasps sting and paralyze their prey then drag the spider back to it's nest where it lays an egg on the live spider. The egg soon hatches and the larvae feeds on the spider (watch Alien if you would like another example of this behavior with other species) This newly discovered behavior led to the common name of the wasp, and has also been very interesting to entomologists. The redback spiders have spread from Australia to Japan and New Zealand, and perhaps these wasps could be introduced to control the populations of the spiders in those areas. Though I am sure there is MUCH research to be done before those options can be considered.

Citations:
huffingtonpost.com
ouramazingplanet.com