A hollow stinger is located at the rear of the yellow jacket's body. Upon penetrating the skin, a venom is injected through the stinger. These stings can be quite painful. They can also be very dangerous to people who have developed an allergy to the stings. Unlike the bee, a yellow jacket can sting more than once.
Wasps can also damage fruit when they create holes by eating the flesh.
People often mistake bees for yellow jackets because of their colouring, however they are very different. Bees sting once and then die, but wasps can sting repeatedly. These social insects live in large caste-divided colonies. The life cycle of the yellow jacket consists of the egg, larva, pupa and adult life stages. When spring arrives, the queen comes out of dormancy, begins feeding and searches for a nest site to begin her new colony.