Unidentified Aphid Predators

[ChasMacey]

Hi,

Can anyone suggest a possible Id for these two aphid predators below please ? Pictures were taken on 11th and 12th June 2007 on broadbean plants in my garden in Farnham Surrey.













Regards Chas

[Derby411]

Hi are they Syrphid Larva? I think they eat aphid! (Syrphid are flies)

[Pudding4brains]

Looking at all the little feet my uneducated guess would be Sawfly larvae (which are not "Flies" but "Wasps" )
Arp

[Paul mabbott]

Laurence will tell us! I think the bottom is certainly a hoverfly (syrphid) larva. The second looks much like it but larger and a different colour - could be stages of the same beast?

[Dogghound]

The second two are Syrphid (hoverfly larva) the top three are pictures of a sawfly larva. You can tell by the body segmentation, and amount of legs. Did you actually see this eat aphids? would be extremely interesting if you did as im pretty certain there are no predatory species here

[ChasMacey]

Hi All

Thanks for the replies, I didn't think about Syrphid larvae for either of these two as I have kept back a couple more un-identifed ones that I though might be Syrphid for another post later.

I had also ruled out sawfly because I understood them to be vegetarian and I believe both of these to be aphid predators, and have uploaded a further picture of the first one, I believe it is attacking an aphid but the picture is not 100% definative in that respect.


Regards Chas

[haematocephalus]

I think these might all be hoverfly larvae, including the first three photos. There are some hoverflies that have 'legs', not really legs or even the prolegs of caterpillars, but fleshy protruberances. I can't see any of the true legs (i.e. the front three pairs) that a sawfly would have.

Looking through Graham Rotheray's book on hoverfly larvae the genus Eupeodes looks as if it is one possibility, or maybe even Platycheirus.

Martin


Martin Harvey
Buckinghamshire and Milton Keynes Environmental Records Centre

[ChasMacey]

Thanks Martin,

I think that that is certainly more likely, so it's off to WWW now to look for
Graham Rotheray's book and do some reading up.

Thanks again to all who replied.

Regards Chas