Wax moth larvae eating plastic bag waste

A trillion plastic bags per year. That staggering number is what ends up in land fill and our oceans so imagine if we could do something about it. A chance discovery has led to hope that nature has provided an answer to this overwhelming problem in the form of a grub which is the larvae of the wax moth. This little creature has proven it is capable of eating through significant amounts of plastic which has given scientists unexpected hope that on a large scale our plastic waste might become a thing of the past. This amazing discovery was made by a scientist who was cleaning the caterpillars from the honeycomb of her bee hives. The wax moth lays its eggs in the honeycomb so that when they hatch they have food. She found that the grubs had eaten holes in the plastic bag she put them in and it turns out that more studies have revealed some astonishing facts about these little critters that could transform our plastic waste. 

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