How do wasps stimulate one another prior to swarm departure?

When a colony of the swarm-founding social wasp loses its nest, the adult population evacuates and temporarily clusters onto nearby foliage. Most of the adults remain inactive in the cluster, while foragers bring food and scouts search for a new nesting site. Upon success, the scouts return to stimulate the rest of the swarm to leave the cluster and follow their pheromone trail to the new site.

Analysis of the behavior of scouts and inactive wasps indicated an increase in the frequency with which scouts bump into inactive wasps prior to swarm departure. It shows a shift in the behavior of inactive wasps from primarily receiving bumps to bumping others before departure, causing a chain reaction. Thus, bumping is propagated by recently activated individuals before they take off.

More Info: m.jinsectscience.oxfordjournals.org

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11 Comments

Kathryn Cavanagh

Allen Lerch, read the second paragraph.

Kathryn Cavanagh

My answer was sort of jokingly done, the I found I was correct.. ..had a giggle at it. But having said that, the information here is very interesting and gives a new perspective to the " pay it forward " idea that's doing the rounds.

George Oliver Prince

I find this sometimes works when trying to get my wife to leave for a movie...and maybe not

Julie Allen

Well that didn't work but it says that scouts bump inactive wasps and then they follow pheromone trail, left by scout wasps, to a new site.

Julie Allen

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3011882/

Marian Spitzig

Reference link not working. When I googled, I got a pheromone trail.

Ian Swindale

A very poor question - I agree with many of the comments of others

Anne Patrick

The question was far too general to elicit the desired answer. The behaviour described is from Swarm Emigration in the Social Wasp Polybia occidentalis when they are leaving a damaged nest. It does not reflect the behaviour of other wasp species swarming for other reasons such as danger near their nest etc.