This fig One of the most appetizing and popular fruits of the summer season, the fig, which many people overlook, is that it contains a surprising secret: Each of these berries is found on the corpse of a wasp.
No need to worry, because the aforementioned bug (which we inadvertently swallow with every fig we eat) it is already completely fragmented and even forms part of the fruit.. This is specifically the so-called fig wasp. But how did it get there?
These insects are mainly responsible for pollinating fig trees so the trees can continue to thrive and bear delicious fruit year after year. Therefore, the existence of fig trees would not be possible without these bees.
Aristotle had previously described, animal historyThat wild fig fruits contain wasps that form as larvae, breaking the “skin” of the pupa and flying like midges. He believed that they were spontaneously produced by the generation.
This is how they get in
Not exactly like that. Unlike other trees that have open flowers and are easily accessible to insects, The flowers of fig trees are contained within the fruits we see, they are closed and difficult to pollinate.
Of course, this greatly complicates the reach of insects from flower to flower. But the same isn’t true for the fig wasps, which are the only insects that can burrow into the flower and transfer pollen from a male tree to a female tree.
In this way, they lay their eggs on the male flowers (usually inedible end fruits) and when the larvae grow and emerge from that edge, covered with pollen, ready to pollinate, they go to the female figs.
In this way, the wasps manage to move the pollen from one flower to another, but at a very high cost because the operation costs their lives. When wasps enter the female fig, they enter through a very narrow channel and can never come out again.
As a result, the insect dies inside, and its remains become fertilizer, which will help the fruit to develop. Thus, when we eat figs, we also eat the remains of the wasp. we will never detect even the slightest residueas it is already fully integrated into the fruit.
Fig wasps are actually a group of species. are often unrelated to each other, but have morphological similarities stemming from their life cycle in figs. Scientists are actually still clarifying their taxonomies, and there are several hornet families grouped under this definition.
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