Wasps eat nectar from flowers, but they also sometimes drink the juice of grapes! Wasps are therefore really important to local farmers in Trier. Besides pollenating plants, they also help turn grapes into wine. To make wine, grapes have to ferment (which is a type of chemical process). When wasps bite into the grapes, the grapes actually begin to ferment more quickly. That means that wasps and grape farmers help each other out. The wasps get to bite into delicious grapes, and the farmers get a head-start on fermenting their wines!
Over the past 20 years, the population of wasps has decreased by about 50%, mostly due to habitat loss and climate change. Because people are scared of wasps, there is not as much public support for programs to save wasp populations. But luckily, in Trier, wasps have a safe place to live among the grapevines and the flowers.
