The invasive assassin hornet has disappeared from the US, officials confirm

Time to cast one for the killer hornet. Federal and state officials in Washington announced this week that the northern giant hornet (Vespa mandarinia) has been officially eradicated from the United States.

Officials from the Washington State Department of Agriculture (WSDA) and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced the good news on Wednesday. The decision to declare the insect extirpated was made after three years with no confirmed sightings in the state or elsewhere in the country. Scientists worried that the pest could become a prolific predator of honeybees and other native pollinators if it had established itself in the area.

“We are proud of this remarkable victory in the fight against invasive species,” said Mark Davidson, deputy administrator in the USDA’s Office of Animal and Plant Health Inspection, in statement from WSDA.

V. tangerine is the largest hornet living today. It is called the killer hornet because of its cruelty to other insects rather than to humans (however, their stings can be responsible for up to 50 human deaths one year). Wasps have been known to completely destroy beehives within hours, often decapitating their prey. They originate from Asia and first began to appear in the US and Canada in the Pacific Northwest in 2019.

For the next few years, officials, scientists and the public waged a small-scale war against the hornets. People will spot a potential hornet nest in their neighborhood, call their local entomologist, and once the sighting is confirmed, scientists will track down the nest and destroy it. At the height of the invasion, scientists killed as many 1500 hornets on a nest. But from 2021 the hornet hasn’t been showing up in the state – well, probably.

WDSA received an image of a “suspicious hornet” from a Kitsap County resident earlier this October. However, scientists have not been able to obtain an actual specimen of this observation. As a precaution, the WDSA set traps and encouraged area residents to report any erratic-looking wasps, but no further evidence of the hornets’ renewed presence emerged. It is likely that this initial report was simply a misidentification (something that happens quite often with especially those insects), but the WSDA plans to set traps in the county next year just in case.

“Although they have now been eradicated by the state, we will always keep an eye on them and encourage community members to do the same. They got here once and could do it again,” Sven Spichiger, WSDA pest program manager, said in a statement.

Unfortunately, the killer hornet is not the only one an invasive bee-killing wasp this has been causing problems in the US lately. And both native and farmed bees are still standing many other dangers threatening their population numbers. But for once, it looks like we’ve been able to stop the nascent ecological disaster before it’s too late.