COW KILLERS

I was teaching entomology for the first time.  My students and I were out collecting when a student hollered “Cow killer!  Be careful!”  My “momma bear” instincts kicked in and I rushed over, expecting some sort of maniac cow threatening my students.  I was completely perplexed when the students pointed out the offending animal, which they had already secured in a kill jar.  (FYI a “kill jar” is a container used to dispatch/kill insects in a quick and “painless” manner using acetone fumes.)  What they had was a velvet ant (aka cow killer; Dasymutilla species) which is a type of wasp, not ant.  The females look like fuzzy, velvety orange ants on steroids.  They are always wingless.  The males have wings (insert the big bad wolf’s voice saying, “the better to travel and mate with you my dear”) and look more like what folks consider wasps.  Velvet ants parasitize other wasps which they use as a food source.  (Duh, like you really thought they went around paralyzing wasps for fun!)  Like other wasps, the velvet ant has a painful sting.  A sting so stout it feels like it could kill a cow…hence the name “cow killer”.