section_path: Ecology/Parasitism
section_name: Parasitism
paragraph_text: Parasitism
  
  Many insects are parasitic. The largest group, with over 100,000 species and perhaps over a million, consists of a single clade of parasitoid wasps among the Hymenoptera. These are parasites of other insects, eventually killing their hosts. Some are hyper-parasites, as their hosts are other parasitoid wasps. Several groups of insects can be considered as either micropredators or external parasites; for example, many hemipteran bugs have piercing and sucking mouthparts, adapted for feeding on plant sap, while species in groups such as fleas, lice, and mosquitoes are hematophagous, feeding on the blood of animals.