I,ve heard of turkey stuffing and ballot box stuffing but wasp stuffing?
In the 1997 Oct.issue of Nature ( vol. 389, p 450. ) I came across an
article by Philip T. Starks and Emily S.Poe titled " 'Male-stuffing' in
wasp societies."

     The abstract reads in part: "... We have observed an unusual
aggressive interaction between nestmates of the paper wasp Polistes
dominulus."( pretend that name is in italics, if this computer wasn't so
ornery it would be.)..."In response to foragers returning to the colony,
females (workers) initiate aggresive encounters with males culminating with
the male being forced head first into an empty nest cell('male
stuffing'). 'Stuffed' males are unable to feed, so the behaviour seems to
ensure that food is preferentially channelled to larvae, which are likely
to be more closely related to the workers than the adult males."

    The article has sentences like..."We observed two catagories of
stuffing. 'Initial stuffing' (Fig. 1) began with antenna-to-antenna contact
and was followed by grappling, biting and sting-threats. The aggressor then
forced the recipient head-first into an empty cell. 'Repeated stuffing' was
characterized by biting and pushing the abdomen of an individual whose head
and thorax were already inside a cell." I guess Hymenoptera just have no
respect for males.


    Several years ago I worked for a beekeeper in Australia who had a few
hives that did not cap their brood cells. He called this condition 'bald
brood'. The pupae seemed to developed normally. Is anyone familiar with
this trait? Does it have any impact on the life cycle of varroa?

    Regards,

      Ted