Unidentified wasp with black and white antennae

[Bruce Williams]

Stony Stratford, Bucks. On old wooden fence below willow, ash and sycamore.

Help with identification appreciated as always:



Bruce

[Jason Green]

Evening Bruce,

Likely Ichneumonidae. Nice-looking, shame it can't be taken further.

Take care,

Jason

[Bruce Williams]

Thanks for your input Jason.

So are there quite a number of different species with the same black-white-black antennae? Is it worth making a short-list or are there too many possibles to make it worthwhile? Does the dark-honey coloured abdomen help at all?

Out of interest, this individual was a pig to photograph! It never stopped moving or turning so I ended up using continuous autofocus and just clicking away. If I'd had a spare hand I'd have crossed my fingers too!

Bruce

[Jason Green]

A short-list (though it may not be short!) is an interesting idea, but a lack of literature covering the UK species is probably a little prohibitive. I believe there is a RES key, but only covering the sub-families - not individual species.

You could try HyMIS - but I personally doubt an ID could be reliably gained from a photograph.

[JRsbugs]

Bruce! We've done it again!

Mine was around 8mm, how long was yours? The only real difference I can see is mine has some red on the hind femur.

There's a myriad of wasp families, and not all belong to Braconidae or Ichneumonidae as some might have you believe.

Look at Cryptinae..

[Cryptinae] Ophioninae? Le monde des insectes

Woodland and Hedgerow parasitic wasps

I had the same trouble, I took a few shots and kept only this one, it was a runner like many wasps are!

Janet

[Jason Green]

Cryptinae (only sub-family) can be identified by:

Clypeus barely wider than high and highly convex, margin without row of setae; veins not thickened around 2rs-m, cross veins distinct and sheaths of female thin and flexible

...from Gavin Broad's interesting British key to Ichneumonidae sub-families. Alas, none of these pointers can be seen from the photo in question. While it appears to be a Cryptin by the colour combination - it is rarely that simple unfortunately. With 2,000+ in the UK I'm sure the colour combination is repeated across several genera/sub-families.

At least we seem to agree on family! (shortish ovipositor, one part to the hind trochanter seperates Ichs, from Bracs which are the reverse).

Read the PDF for yourself: http://www.brc.ac.uk/downloads/Ichne...family_key.pdf - happy reading! If it stops raining I'll hopefully be able to pop out today...

[Bruce Williams]

Very similar aren't they Janet . Usually I can give very accurate size info. as I almost always work manually at closest focus (size of subject permitting) so can relate my subject to the D300 sensor size. However, as in this instance I was having to chase and shoot with autofocus I can only go on memory and a fading impression....and 8mm feels about right. Thanks for the interesting links....and cripes 6,000+ species of parasitic wasps in the UK (your Jeremy Early link) - I had no idea!.

Thanks for the great info Jason and for a really excellent link. Hope you manage(d) to get out for a while .

Bruce

[Jason Green]

Thanks Bruce. Yes, there seems to be a quick respite. Nothing much of note in the garden - one bee, a Calypterate fly, a few nice Trichocerids (probably Trichocera annulata), and the usual springtails and barkflies.

[turntostone]

Bruce,

Great photos as usual. What type of lens do you use. Is it a macro or telephoto used in pseudo-macro mode. I also guess you use a ring flash.


I am using a Sony Alpha 330 with macro lens and cannot always get close enough to get a large image without the object flying away and when I do most seem to have focus issues?

Gordon

[Bruce Williams]

Thanks Gordon .

I use a Nikon 105mm f2.8 Macro VR lens - usually with 36mm extension tube (on D300). I use a Nikon SB-R1 close-up flash unit with 2 x SB-R200 diffused flash heads. The D300 pop-up flash controls the two flash heads and each head can be independently rotated and set to different flash powers, see: Nikon Close-up Speedlight Kits | Nikon

Yes, getting close enough can be a problem and it's always that unusual specimen that decides to wing it at the last moment! Focus can be a problem too. To get a reasonable depth of field I typically stop down to f/14 and (begrudgingly) accept that there will be some loss of detail due to diffraction softening. What macro lens and settings (typically) are you using Gordon?

Bruce