Talk:Wasp

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Wikipedia CD Selection Wasp is either included in the 2006 Wikipedia CD Selection or is a candidate for inclusion in the next version (the project page is at WPCD Selection). Please maintain high quality standards, and if possible stick to GFDL and GFDL-compatible images.
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Contents

[edit] This page needs a lot more information

Social & Reproductive behaviour, etc, etc.

[edit] Ethnonym

Is it also an acronym for "White Anglo-Saxon Protestant", or am I Wrong? --G

Yeah. I'd put it under WASP which is how it's usually written. user:sjc

I thought, though I may be wrong, that it was originally WASPS - White Anglo-Saxon Protestant Settler, but the S sometimes disappears because people think the 's' was to make it plural, not part of the acronym. STÓD/ÉÍRE 03:01 Apr 10, 2003 (UTC)

Never heard of that form, at least not in the US. People going West were more likely to be called "pioneers" than "settlers", and much of the use of WASP was to distinguish the city-dwelling descendants of the English from Irish, Italians, Jews, and other undesirables :-), and "settler" would have been nonsensical in that context. Perhaps WASPS was used in Africa or Australia?? Stan 03:15 Apr 10, 2003 (UTC)

No. It was meant to refer to an American elite descended from the first settlers and so predate later waves of emigration. STÓD/ÉÍRE 03:23 Apr 10, 2003 (UTC)

It's certainly a possible etymology, but for instance my English ancestor that arrived in the 1860s would have been considered a WASP, and not, say, the 17th century settlers of the southern colonies who were Catholics. Presumably somebody has researched this already though. Stan 05:07 Apr 10, 2003 (UTC)
BTW Google on '"white anglo-saxon protestant" baltzell' shows quite a few citations of the term having been coined by E. Digby Baltzell in the early 1960s, and just as WASP. Stan 05:13 Apr 10, 2003 (UTC)

[edit] Layout

Of course, the best way to make the image fit better would be to fill up that space to the left of it with info. <g> -- John Owens 05:33 Apr 10, 2003 (UTC)

[edit] Phylogeny reference

The best online treatment of Hymenoptera phylogeny found so far is this description of the Order HYMENOPTERA. Paragraphs 3,4, and 5 detail the the Symphyta and the Apocrita.--azwaldo

[edit] Wasp images

  1. I used the newer image markup for the drinking wasp image thinking it would help with the problem that the horizontal rules draw right thru it (on my browser, anyway); it didn't help. So whichever.
  2. I added a wasp building a nest. I have no idea what kind of wasp. If anyone can identify it or suggest a better place for the photo, I'd be delighted to hear. I tried reading thru existing assorted wasp articles, including Yellowjacket, Paper wasp, Vespid, which seemed like possibilities, but I just don't know. Elf | Talk 22:36, 16 Mar 2004 (UTC)
It's a Polistes wasp.Pollinator 02:13, 17 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Incidently the photo is rotated 90 degrees from the correct orientation. The "stem" of the nest should be at the top. Pollinator 02:16, 17 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Thanks! You're good! And that is the correct orientation, interestingly enough. It's trying to build a nest between two upright studs on my back porch, dagnabbit. Elf | Talk 02:23, 17 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I have removed one image (the rolling .gif image) and added a new one showing in anatomical detail the basic morphology of a female yellow jacket wasp. This was done because Wikipedia is not a source for clipart or pictures and there are only so many pictures nessessary before they start to show the same over and over again, without adding any extra detail. So I have sacraficed some of the similar or poor quality pictures of wasps in favour of one which labels all the different parts. I also believe the rolling gif also contains copyrighted images ripped from goggle. I know this because i came across them when i was doing my research for my diagram - . Over the next few days I'll be adding a lot more scientific, trivia and general information to this article. It really stands a good chance of being a featured article! Lets do what we can to put this on the front page! --WikipedianProlific(Talk) 17:26, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

I propose we delete the picture of the wasp where 'you can see the fine hairs' although its nice, its not as good as the other photos and you can see the fine hairs in the syrup photo 194.83.140.31 16:55, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Scientific classification consistency

The scientific classification charts on wasp, hornet, and yellowjacket are not consistent, making it impossible to compare how closely related these insects are. I am not familiar enough with them to make the correction. --zandperl 04:15, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Aliens

I removed the following because is seems like total speculation and provides no source:

Wasps are probably the inspiration for the titular creatures of the Alien series of films. This form of predation is also seen in the Black Arms from the Sega video game Shadow the Hedgehog.

Ashmoo 01:45, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Added entire reproduction section, pushing towards GA status.

One of my major updates to this article other than the addition of a diagram is this section. I'm not a big wasp biologist though so there may be inacuracies, if nessessary changes are most welcome. I will also be adding additional sections for this article. Hopefully we can get it nominated for front page status. Any thoughts on how to go about that are probably best put here. --WikipedianProlific(Talk) 18:08, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The queen

She is rather the reproductive element of the colony as all members of the colony are theoretically direct genetic descendents of the queen. This could do with some explanation. Theoretically, but not actually? Whose theory is this, and why are wasps affected by it? HenryFlower 16:12, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

I wouldn't feel confident making the edit myself as i'm not 100% sure but I believe it relates to the idea that some colonies deliberately keep several queens (seperated from each other) so that if one dissapears/dies/loses the ability to reproduce etc. the others can continue to produce an influx of workers to the colony rapidly without the need to make an 'emergency queen'. Its possible therefore that a colony comprising of several queens might not be genetically identical. Consider equally that as in humans, I imagine wasps are just as subject to minor genetic variation through translational errors, mutation, trisomies, polyploid errors etc. as to mean that not all offspring of the queen can be considered direct genetic descendents, even though by and large i'm sure the utterly vast majority of the colony is an indentical copy of their queen right down to the base pair sequences. --WikipedianProlific(Talk) 00:31, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] How to not get stung if a person wants to drive off a wasp

Do you think it fits in the encyclopedia, a section regarding human behaviour on how to act to not get stung by a wasp?

I wonder what wasps get attracted to on a human, or generally all things that could attract a wasp from a distant location [ie. if a wasp can smell its surroundings, like sweat(partly water) and salt, dead skin... I'm not sure about this, even if I've seen something that looked like wasps flying around water on the ground]

Logictheo 08:56, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Queen

Towards the end of the summer the female wasps begin to run out of stored sperm to fertilize more eggs. These eggs develop into fertile males and fertile female queens.
I'm pretty sure this is wrong... IMO:

  1. the queen can control if it lays a fertilized egg or an unfertilized one
  2. a new queen develops from a fertilized eqq--Laur2ro | Talk 10:23, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Vandalism

Gah. Tried to revert it by clicking undo, but only seemed to make it worse. So I manually erased the text of it, but it seems to have messed up the edit links. Think I need to read up on the formatting and interface before I try that again. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.117.209.196 (talk) 06:49, 13 December 2006 (UTC).

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