Wasps have a bad rap; this summer, let's learn to love them
By: CNN
By Jen Rose Smith, CNN
(CNN) -- Before you swat a stinging wasp away from your next picnic, pause to consider the delicate and beautiful hammer orchid.
The Australian flowers evolved to resemble the rear end of a female thynnine wasp. It's a ruse to attract male thynnine wasps.
When a passing wasp makes his move on the flower — tries to have sex with it, in other words — he inadvertently deposits pollen on the orchid's stigma. Without amorous wasps, these remarkable flowers would never bloom again.