Observations by bicolor-jxql

An old observation showing aberrant individuals and colour variation within hornets, even in the same locality and colour form.

The colour form of Vespa velutina in Hong Kong is the southern Chinese form, sometimes referred to as ssp nigrithorax by those who still use subspecies. It has a fully black thorax and the head is partially black on top and orange in the front.

In this nest, however, you can see individuals with red heads and varying amounts of red on parts of the thorax such as the pronotum.

The nest was later removed. In the second photo the comb and envelope has been removed but the queen and some workers returned to the nest, and you can see that the queen and most of the others are normal but one of the red-headed individuals remains.

The third photo shows a closeup of one of the aberrant individuals.

In this same year (2008), I found such aberrant individuals from another two nests. It must be noted that a large percentage of the aberrant individuals were stylopized (parasitized by Strepsipterans). A small number, however, were not. I am not sure as to whether there's a clear link to colour aberrations and Strepsipteran parasitization. In Vespa affinis, however, it is clearly not the case as large numbers of individuals of the Malayan colour form with the first tergum largely or wholly black instead of orange are common and often found foraging and behaving normally.

Nest inside a metal drain cover. This date is the day the nest was first found, and I continued to observe it till late November that year. I never managed to uncover the nest, but it went undisturbed despite high human traffic to this urban park and the colony died naturally.