Leijpark013

@leijpark013 · 07 Apr 2022

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Leijpark 013 Herb Sawfly

Published by Thierry P. Dinjens · 30 March at 4:46 PM ·
We sometimes watch a movie like Jurassic Park or walking through Naturemuseum Brabant and when we are confronted with dinosaurs like that, we think: “It's a good thing that these animals no longer exist now. They would attack and eat us up immediately.” A justifiable thought. Don't panic: more than 66 million years ago, they died out, probably due to the impact of a giant meteorite.
However, this does not mean that everything that lived then is no longer there. There are animals that are so great adapted to their environment, that they have changed little to nothing and still surround us now.
A good example of this can be found among the sawfly wasps: the Herb Sawfly. This beautiful insect reminds us of a monster at first sight. You should not remember that such a sawfly would have the dimensions of the insects that flew around in prehistoric times. Then true giants filled the airspace. The insects were able to grow so big at that time because the air consisted of 31 percent oxygen, against a paltry 21 percent now. Everything that lives needs oxygen and oxygen promotes the growth of living things. Exactly why we spoil unwanted plants under an anti-root cloth; once the oxygen is cut off, growth stops immediately.
Sawflies were already around 220 million years ago; you can hardly imagine that many years. The Herb Sawfly depends on the herb. This plant thrives in the Leijpark, so that's where we found this sawfly. At first glance, you think of a real wasp, because of the typical yellow-black bands on the body of the sawfly. This phenomenon is called mimicry: another living thing (or its properties) are imitated. In this case, the sawfly imitates a real wasp and says, “I am dangerous because I am poisonous and I can sting!” In practice, this is not the case, but I can imagine that a person could just be mistaken. The Herb Sawfly, however, betrays itself when you look better. There is no wasp in our country (not even the hornet) that has such bright orange colored feelers. There we prick through the theater of the emergency standard.
However, many animals do not do this and so the Herb Sawfly assures that few predators will eat it. Only some spiders will not be cast; moreover, many spiders can store poison in their bodies to separate again later, so should it be a real wasp that they snare in their nets, then no man is left overboard.
The larvae of the Herb Sawfly are called bastard drops. Real caterpillars, of course, belong to butterflies, but because the larvae look like caterpillars, we came up with this appropriate word for it. The caterpillars eat the herb, the adult sawflies feed on flies.
The Wormsawwasp has been given that it may continue for a long time. For millions of years, she was able to spring the dance of extinction to now be confronted with a time when there are so few flowers and plants left, that many tribes of the insect world are now at risk of extinction. We can do something about that! Do not participate in the mass culture in which only one more crop is grown and all others are removed with agricultural poison. What we can do is nurture our Leij Park, where such animals still find the necessary food. Anyway: Don't let us get what many hundreds of millions of years didn't. The Herb Sawfly has been forgiven for acting, because now say for yourself: Who never plays the stage?

Leijpark 013 #anherbwasp