The email from Trip Lamb, biology professor at Eastern Carolina University, said, “As a velvet ant sting survivor, you may appreciate the attached.” The attachment was a scientific paper titled “The Indestructible Insect: Velvet Ants from across the United States.” The authors were Brian G. Gall of Indiana’s Hanover College and colleagues.

Velvet ants are not actually ants. They belong to a family of more than 3,000 wasps found worldwide. Around 480 species have been reported from the United States. Tiny bristles covering the body give them a velvety appearance. The females do not have wings. An eastern variety, called a cow killer, looks like an enormous, bright red ant. It walks around during the day in search of ground-nesting bees and wasps and lays an egg in the nest. A developing bee or wasp eats the egg and becomes parasitized internally. If you remember the movie “Alien,” you know the rest.

Trip and I experienced two memorable events involving velvet ants when we worked together at the University of Georgia’s Savannah River Ecology Lab years ago. I distinctly remember the painful sting he referred to in his email. The other event made up for the unpleasant one.

Velvet ants have enormous stingers half their body length, and the research paper focused on the full defense system of these near-indestructible wasp parasites against a variety of terrestrial and avian predators, including amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals. For openers, velvet ants give fair warning that they are dangerous. Any distinctively colored insect walking around completely exposed during the day typically has an arsenal of some sort up its sleeve. When threatened, the velvet ant makes a buzzing sound from its abdomen and releases an alarm chemical from glands in the mouth area. Clear warning signs. The velvet ant’s body is extraordinarily strong, Iron Man of the insect world. One study showed that it took 11 times more pressure to crush a velvet ant than a honeybee.

Any predator that hasn’t taken the hint by now must deal with the stinger. According to a study conducted on the human pain index, a velvet ant’s sting came in fourth out of 62 species of wasps and bees, with 58 being judged to be less painful. The investigators in the study found that the defense system of the velvet ant is so effective that despite 100 interactions with bluebirds, mockingbirds, toads, lizards, shrews and other predators, only one velvet ant was consumed and digested. Three others were eaten and regurgitated unharmed. The single victim was one eaten by a large toad that became ill for a day. In a later experiment, the toad ate mealworms but would have nothing to do with a proffered velvet ant.

Although not part of the study on predator responses to velvet ants, I can confirm that their sting will ensure that you are cautious with the next one you find. My error was in showing a group of students how impressively long a velvet ant stinger is. Trip and the others watched me pin down a large velvet ant with a matchstick. Too short. I ignored the velvet ant’s buzzing warning and underestimated the length of the half-inch-long black stinger that went right into my thumb. Painful, yes, but with one consolation. The searing pain lasted only about a minute and then subsided with no swelling or other evidence of a sting. I’m not sure how other victims would fare, but that was my experience.

And what was the gratifying encounter I later had with a velvet ant? Trip and I were standing beside a bush when a velvet ant with black wings landed right in front of us. I grabbed it and held on. We looked it over for a minute or so, marveling at such an elegant insect and then let it fly away. Only male velvet ants have wings and, of course, male wasps and bees don’t sting.