Baby hornets are called larvae and are hatched from eggs laid by the queen in 5-8 days. They belong to the phylum Arthropoda. Almost 22 species of Vespa have been discovered worldwide.

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Vespa crabro is a European hornet that has a large vertex and round abdomen. The adult hornets feed baby hornets with insects (protein-rich diet) like honeybees, locusts, grasshoppers, etc. This article will discuss what do baby hornets look like and their physical appearance.

What Baby Hornets Look Like?

Like all wasps, baby hornets go through three stages (egg, larva, and pupa) before becoming an adult. Queen lays about 1000 jelly-like eggs in the cells of the hive. The activities like embryo development can be seen inside the eggs. Egg hatches in almost 5-8 days, and the larval stage begins. 

Larvae are legless maggots and are elevated in the cells of the hive. Larval body is like worms and has a round head. They rapidly grow in size and store food for the next stages. The larva digests the chewed food provided to them and produces droplets of fluids visible on their bodies. After 12- 18 days, the larva then covers the opening of the cell with a silk cap (cocoon) by spinning around. Silk is produced with pinprick-sized salivary glands. Larva takes two days to finish cocoons, and inside it, the larva becomes motionless.

Larva and pupa go through 5 stages (instars) within the next 12-14 days. In the pupal stage, the head and jaws are emerged by split opening the larval skin. After 13-15 days, the baby hornet bites the silk cap and comes out. The firstborn hornets are workers that take over the duties (feeding) of the queen. The baby hornets develop into three types of adult hornets (queen, workers, and drone).