Select the language

Notifications

Loading…

Wasps were building paper nests millions of years before humans made paper

Wasps were building paper nests millions of years before humans made paper

Wasps were building paper nests millions of years before humans made paper

Paper wasps chew wood fibers with saliva into durable pulp and sculpt hexagonal nurseries — papermaking invented without factories.

Humans arrived at similar sheets millions of years later; insects already had the patent in behavior.

Culture takes credit; nature filed first. A gray nest under the eaves is an old library of pulp.

Shahzad Mahota Shahzad Mahota @shahzad-mahota

Wasps were building paper nests millions of years before humans made paper