Video shows ‘murder hornets’ destroying an entire bee hive

For every heart warming story – or sweet video – of animals wandering around a zoo or a museum during lockdown, there’s always an opposite – like a terrifying video of murder hornets.

‘Murder hornets’ arrived on the West coast of the US earlier this year – as though there wasn’t enough to be worried about – and they originate in Japan.

Scientists and researchers are still unsure about how exactly they were able to get to the US, but they’ve been spotted in several states.

In Washington, a team of researchers is working on the best way to trace their movements and to get rid of the nests which already exist.

They can grow as long as 2 inches, and they have a sharp jaw and a stinger.

In terms of their risk to human populations, you probably don’t want to go looking for one, but if you were to come across one, they don’t attack unless provoked and it takes multiple stings to actually kill a person. Researchers are more worried about their threat to the bee population.

For bees, however, they’re a serious danger.

A video posted by Vice News shows them destroying an entire beehive.

The footage isn’t new but is terrifying anyway.

The hornets destroy bees by ripping off their heads and pulverising them into a kind of mash. That mash then becomes food for their young, as bees are high in protein and can provide a lot of energy.

If you hadn’t already hunkered down and isolated yourself, the footage of the hornets should do the trick.