A new type of wasp turns spiders into zombies and kills them slowly

There is a kind of wasp who kills me spiders one of the most disturbing and sadistic ways imaginable. First, he lays his eggs on the spider 's abdomen, then the arachnid begins to isolate, loses his head and eventually, knocked out, waits for the first time. to be eaten alive.

No, this is not a horror film, but how some wasps of the Ecuadorian Amazon. These are insects of the genus "zatypota". And a team of scientists has discovered how they work: with a cynicism that, without "nature", we could define a kind of sadistic premeditation.

"Wasps manipulating the behavior of spiders have already been observed, but not at such a complex level"said Philippe Fernandez-Fournier, lead author of the study."Not only does this wasp target a "social" spider species, but it manages to get her out of her colony, which is rarely the case"The wasp is pointing straight at the spider, laying an egg on the abdomen and waiting." From the moment of spawning, the spider begins to not understand and, as observed by scientists, begins to isolate from the colony.

A very particular behavior, since generally these arachnids live in community. "As if she were delighted by some kind of stun (the researchers attribute stunning to a hormonal effect), the spider escapes from her mates and will create a cocoon for the enemy larva , in the expectation of being eaten alive. Ten or twelve days after the death of the spider (which has meanwhile laid out a house for its host), the larva has grown and stands out"he explains Time. a horrible death which also adds wasp cynicism. Not only do they kill them slowly, but they also target spiders offering more wealth, those of the colony.