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Two-girdled Digger Wasp
Ragwurz-Zikadenwespe
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This is a Common Ectemnius, a type of square-headed wasp that's new to me. I thought it had the cutest little antennae. It was peering downwards for the longest time. What it was interested in, I'll never know.
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France; Brenne, Merigny (36) 8/8/24.
France; Brenne, Merigny (36) 2/8/24.
Pison sp. on the valuable, hole riddled fallen wood. The type of wood that many people burn or "clean up".
Cerceris rybyensis ♀ / Lasioglossum calceatum
Ornate Tailed Digger Wasp .... in flight with a Halictid Bee as food for its larvae
Bienenjagende Knotenwespe ... fliegend mit einer Furchenbiene als Larvennahrung
Gravehveps ......... flyvende med en vejbi som føde til sine larver
Exposure time (= flash duration): 50 µs = 1/20.000 s
Similar to the Bee Wolf (Philanthus triangulum) which catches Honey Bees, this much smaller solitary wasp (body length 13mm) is preying on little wild bees as provision for its larvae.
Please no Copy & Paste Comments, awards and so on!
Bitte keine kopierten Kommentare, Auszeichnungen etc.!
Crabro peltarius ♀
Digger Wasp ... in flight to its nest with a fly as food for its larvae
Grabwespe ..... fliegt mit einer Fliege als Larvennahrung zum Nest
Gravehveps .... flyver til reden med en flue som føde til sine larver
Exposure time (= flash duration): 50 µs = 1/20.000 s
Please no Copy & Paste Comments, awards and so on!
Bitte keine kopierten Kommentare, Auszeichnungen etc.!
Philanthus triangulum
European beewolf
Bienenwolf
Пчелиный волк
Warming on Zinc basin.
France; Brenne, Lignac (36) 12/7/24
A rare species and one of the hosts for the Hedychrum chalybaeum cuckoo wasp, which I meet at the same location. Happy Wing Wednesday!
The returns were poor when I visited the Gullringskärret nature reserve near my home in Västerhaninge south of Stockholm, Sweden in mid-August (of 2020).
This one however stayed long enough for me to shoot. It is a field digger wasp (Mellinus arvensis), a species which hunts flies and bury them in a burrow as provisions for the larvae which emerges from the egg the wasp lays on the fly in there.
The field digger wasp (Mellinus arvensis) is a solitary wasp who catches flies and bury them in egg chambers dug in sand/soil. I say solitary in that each female digs her own nest, but they still live in colonies and can still dig very close to others (like 10 cm) which was the case in my mother-in-law's garden where there suddenly were a whole bunch of holes dug in the ground.
I staked the place out and quickly discovered that these were the culprits.
This particular specimen was sitting still on a wood railing, so still that I managed to take two photos which I stacked manually using Photoshop into this image .
France; Brenne, Lignac (36) 10/7/24
France; Brenne, Lignac (36) 10/7/24.
Note; Male facial pattern
