The hunt for the “murder hornet” in the northwest corner of Washington State began like a criminal investigation, with bee carcasses comprising a crime scene and the public being asked to send tips about the potential culprit’s whereabouts.
Search grids were created. Traps were set. Soon, state entomologists were able to capture some of the wayward hornets, affixing tiny tracking devices on the insects to trace them back to their lairs. Crews wearing otherworldly protective equipment moved in to eliminate the nests.
Officials believe it all worked. On Wednesday, five years after the invasive hornets were sighted for the first time in Washington State, state and federal agencies announced that they had successfully eradicated the species from that hot spot and the nation. That dispelled their initial fears that the hornet might spread rapidly enough to establish itself in the United States for good.
“We are proud of this landmark victory in the fight against invasive species,” said Mark Davidson, deputy administrator at the U.S.D.A.’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service.
In total, Washington State officials found four nests related to the introduction of the hornet in Whatcom County, an area along the Canadian border where farmers cultivate millions of pounds of raspberries and blueberries each year. The state has now gone three years without any new hornet discoveries in that region.
Officials acknowledged the possibility that a new invasion might happen in the future, especially given that they remained uncertain how the insect, a native of Asia known among entomologists as the northern giant hornet, was introduced into the region.
Case in point: the state was still investigating another reported hornet discovery about 100 miles away from the original nests. Washington State officials did not believe the new hornet was connected to the prior introduction and had not found any other evidence of the hornet establishing itself, but they deployed traps to monitor the area.
“They got here once and they could do it again,” said Sven Spichiger, the pest program manager at the Washington State Department of Agriculture.
In Europe, researchers recently expressed alarm after discovering a related hornet, the southern giant hornet, in northern Spain.
The northern giant hornet, about an inch and a half long, is of particular concern to entomologists because of the threat it poses to other insects, including bees. In Washington State, the “murder hornet” was suspected in a 2019 event, when a beekeeper discovered one of his hives filled with dead bee carcasses, their heads torn from their bodies.
For humans, the hornet can also be a danger. Its stinger can penetrate a beekeeping suit, with stabs that one victim described as “like having red-hot thumbtacks being driven into my flesh.” A swarm of stings can be fatal.
Government agencies and researchers continue to receive various reports of potential hornet sightings, in Washington State and elsewhere, but they have found that the reports are typically of other insects with a similar likeness — cicada killers, yellow jackets, sawflies.
The hornet is formally known as Vespa mandarinia. Experts previously described it as the “Asian giant hornet” and some even less formally as a “murder hornet,” but the Entomological Society of America — responding to concerns about potential anti-Asian sentiment — moved to change the name to the northern giant hornet.
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