Cuckoo wasps are parasitoids and kleptoparasites, laying their eggs in the nests of other species where their young consume the larvae of their hosts.

[4] Chrysis ignita is a chrysidid wasp with a typical colorful, metallic exoskeleton; the stinger is reduced in size and used as an ovipositor.

[5][6] Chrysidids differ from other aculeate wasps (stinging Hymenoptera) in their reduction of the number of external body segments, the presence of 11 antennal articles, and wing veins enclosing 5 cells.

The exoskeleton sculpture appears textured, like a golf ball, with dimples, projections, crests, and holes ranging from micrometric to millimetric in size.

[5] Chrysis ignita can be found in Britain and Ireland, in continental Europe, and through Russia to China and Japan at the eastern edge of the Palearctic.

[1][4][8][9] Its habitats overlap with those of its hosts, and thus it can be found near walls, quarries, bare cliff faces, and around dead wood in sunny places.

The environments in which they are found facilitate their identification and are often characterized by flowers, arid and sandy soil, old wood exposed to sunlight, pebbles, and aphid infested plants.

In the second strategy, the cuckoo wasp waits for the host larva to reach its prepupal stage, and it kills it after clearing the nest of food sources.

The second strategy is generally utilized when the host species is a nectar and pollen gatherer, stocking up its nests with food sources that contain nutrients the cuckoo wasp cannot synthesize itself.

The chrysidid stinger is essentially nonfunctional, having been reduced to an ovipositor in females and a genital tube in males.

Chrysis ignita is generally colored, and takes on its metallic, iridescent sheen through light interference, and thus varies with the viewing angle.

The coloration is most apparent on the body of the wasp, and reduced to spots and stripes on the legs, mandibles, antenna, and abdominal tergites.

[9] It has also been hypothesized that there may be an environmental relation between the color of the adult and the physical parameters of its developmental environment, like temperature and humidity.

The defense is so effective that even when the mother is caught in the host's nest, she will simply ball up and become impenetrable to even the strongest stings and mandibles.

After the egg is deposited, the ruby-tailed wasp will cover the hole with the original nest material to leave minimal traces of its infiltration.

[13] However, most of these host records, including all those of bee species, are considered doubtful: attributable to misunderstandings, misidentifications, and taxonomic inconsistency.

[15] Bilinski and colleagues, in studying AN in Chrysis ignita, have shed light on the possible function of such accessory nuclei.

They believe that AN have evolved independently of the rest of the wasp, so they can be used to genetically identify closely related species of chrysidid.

[15] Further research may give us insight into the complexity of AN and its role in oocyte compartmentalization – as well as its importance for early embryonic development.

The vast diversity of the cuckoo wasp family, Chrysididae, includes thousands of species, which have individually adapted to their environment and evolved tools uniquely suited to their survival and parasitic activity.

A group in Germany has identified anal teeth as an early adaptive differentiation, which has potential to be used in phylogenetic reconstruction.