For a bit of balance, and following on from our article on blue bees the other day, let’s take a look at the other end of apiological scale.

If those gentle, quiet blue bees were old ladies on trundling mamachari, then vespa mandarinia would be helicopter gunships.

For vespa mandarinia is the giant asian hornet, and if you’ve yet to meet one, believe me, that name is no exaggeration…

(if you’re in any way phobic, leave now)

In a documentary I saw a few years ago (and alas can’t find online) Masato Ono, an entomologist from Tokyo’s Tamagawa University, described the sensation of being stung by one as “like a hot nail through my leg. It is a pain that you can never imagine until you have experienced it. It is profoundly shocking.”

If you have come across them before, either for real or wandering about the internet, then you’re probably aware how these hornets can wreak devastation on honey bees. (video link)

I’d expect most people, like me, to be terrified of these things, but among the people of Japan, feelings about the giant hornet are mixed.