HOUSTON — There’s a crisis happening in the insect world as killer flying bugs from east Asia are making their new homes in the United States.
Murder hornets are the latest trouble from mother nature this year.
“It is terrible,” said the vice president of education at the Houston Museum of Natural Science, Nicole Temple.
Temple has been tracking the murder hornets since they first arrived on American shores late last year.
The wasps are responsible for the massacre of many North American honey-bee hives.
“They use their mandibles and they rip the heads off the worker bees and then they go on and feast on the pupa which are incubating and growing,” Temple said. “So they take out the current population of bees and the next generation as well.”
They don’t just go after bees, though.
One of their stings can deliver seven times the amount of venom as a honey-bee, strong enough to kill a human.
They don’t just sting. They can bite, too.
“It would feel like you’re getting pinched but it would be pinched by two little knives because they contract into your skin,” Temple said.
The bees have only been spotted in Washington state currently, where officials are trying to stop their spread.
Will they ever make it down to Texas?
“They absolutely can make their way down to Texas, and what will end up happening is they will spread when the seasons end up getting warmer,” Temple said.
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