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As I mentioned yesterday, I found two ichneumon wasps on neighbouring umbellifers at Cosmeston last week. Their identities haven’t yet been confirmed but I think I’ve got them right, because their characteristics fit exactly the description in the Natural History Museum’s superb downloadable pdf, Beginner’s guide to identifying British ichneumonids. Today’s wasp is, I believe, a male Ichneumon sarcitorius.

230811 Ichneumon sarcitorius male (1)

The guide lists this ichneumon’s characteristics as follows:

Another of the medium to large (female=10mm, male=14mm) black-and-yellow or black-and-red species. The size, shape and precise colour patterns are distinctive to this species. … The males [which have black-and-yellow banding] are longer with broad white bands across the abdomen at the hind edges of the segments, with conspicuous indentations on the bands of the second and third segments. The bands on the first and fourth segments are usually broken. Both sexes have hind femora tipped with black.
Habitat: usually seen nectaring on umbellifers or flying through foliage hunting

230811 Ichneumon sarcitorius male (2)