Pimpla? Ichneumon? Or other?!

[Miss Caretaker]

Hi, I don't expect to get very far with this dodgy picture, but a family id would be great!

This was the only one I managed to get before it vanished. As you can see it is tiny (it is resting on the seed head of a mallow in my back garden).
Here's hoping!
Jo

[Jason Green]

Morning Jo,

I'd say Braconidae; although Ichneumonidae can be small too, this has a less robust appearance. From what I think I can make out, the trochanter (the join between the top of the femur and the tip of the coxa which joins it to the body) is elongate and subsequently may be made-up of two segments (I'd have though it quite flimsy if not) - a nice little Braconidae feature as far as I am aware. It also seems to lack the horse-head wing-cell found in Ichneumonidae (with a little educated interpretation!).

Of course, there are a few other families around the Ichneumonoidea superfamily that it could be - but it's Braconidae for me.

Take care,

Jason

[Miss Caretaker]

Great, that's a lot more info than I expected, thanks! There are a fair number of tiny critters like this in our garden atm so I'll see if I can get some better pictures though they are probably all different...
Jo

[Miss Caretaker]

Just as an aside, I did watch one of the ones in our garden poking her abdomen under flower heads and when I looked all the undersides were covered in aphids. Hopefully she was laying her eggs in them; anything that reduces the aphid numbers is fine by me!