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I had a small wasp nest in my bathroom. Initially there were only two to three wasps but the number increased to eight.

Today morning a big wasp-like insect (shown in the image below) came to the nest. I thought that it was the queen but it ate all the larvae and destroyed the nest.

Can someone please tell me if this is a normal behavior of a wasp? Is the "big wasp" their queen or another species?

enter image description here

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The wasp is a Ropalidia marginata Ropalidia marginata

The assailant is a greater banded hornet . enter image description here There is a video of one attacking a wasp nest here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPLRpEkNv8Q

Hornets can attack wasp and bee hives and decimate them. In europe there is an invasive species of hornet from japan which is twice as big as the european hornet.

The abdomen of the hornet is about half of the size of the animal. The abdomen of the queen Ropalidia marginata is about 1/3rd of the animal, she has very similar markings as the hornet, it seems to have evolved as a copy cat that consumes larvae. http://drkrishi.com/ropalidia-social-wasp/

You must add location information to search for animals by region and find the species. I only knew it was india/pak because of the avatar.

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  • $\begingroup$ It is in India Bangalore. Thanks for the help! $\endgroup$
    – Unnikrishnan
    Commented Jul 18, 2017 at 8:53
  • $\begingroup$ What kind of individual is wasp photo you give? It doesn't have the black and yellow pattern you mention about the queen. $\endgroup$
    – bli
    Commented Jul 19, 2017 at 16:45
  • $\begingroup$ If you see the photo from the question, it is the small wasp on the right of the nest, you can see the similarity. the pics of the queen from the same species are on the page by drkrishi. $\endgroup$
    – bandybabboon
    Commented Jul 19, 2017 at 22:13

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