• ABOUT
  • BIRDING 2018
  • Birding 2019
  • BLOG POSTS
  • Butterflies 2018
  • Resources

earthstar

~ a celebration of nature

earthstar

Tag Archives: British wasps

Flying critters

28 Monday Feb 2022

Posted by sconzani in insects

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Andrena flavipes, British bees, British wasps, Lasioglossum species, Vespula vulgaris

Though a cool breeze blew from the south east, yesterday was wonderfully sunny, so I planned my walk to check the more sheltered spots in the local landscape where I hoped I might find newly emerged flying critters. And I got lucky. As well as my first two butterflies of the year (Small tortoiseshell and Brimstone, both too distant for photos with the camera I had with me), I also found some solitary bees and a wasp.

220228 lasioglossum (1)
220228 lasioglossum (2)

Thanks to Liam Olds, of the Colliery Spoil Biodiversity Initiative, I can tell you the two bees above are both ‘female Lasioglossum sp. [species] (morio group but not possible to ID from pics)’ and the bee below is a ‘male Andrena flavipes by the looks’.

220228 andrena flavipes

And the wasp I found basking on a tree trunk is a Vespula vulgaris.

220228 vespula vulgaris

Like this:

Like Loading...

Face to face

10 Wednesday Nov 2021

Posted by sconzani in autumn, insects

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

British wasps, male wasps, Vespula vulgaris, wasp, wasps on ivy

A long section of the coastal path where I walked yesterday was lined with Ivy, covered in ripening clusters of berries … and wasps. It seemed like each nest of wasps (all Vespula vulgaris, as far as I could tell) had laid claim to its own bush, where they sat preening on leaves, wandered over the berries, or just snoozed, and I was able to get quite close for some photos.

211110 wasp (1)

I’ve just been reading on the really informative Eakringbirds website that ‘Many wasps found on flowers from August onwards will often be males. These tend to be more docile and slightly less active than workers and often make better photographic subjects’, and that was certainly the case for me yesterday.

211110 wasp (2)

Like this:

Like Loading...

139/366 A tale of two galls

18 Monday May 2020

Posted by sconzani in insects, nature

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

Bedeguar gall wasp, British wasps, Diplolepis rosae, Orthopelma mediator, parasite of Bedeguar gall wasp, parasite of Diplolepis rosae, parasitic wasp, Robin's pincushion

This is a tale of two galls. One gall (below, left) was created by the Thistle gall fly (Urophora cardui), the other (below, right) by the Bedeguar gall wasp (Diplolepis rosae). I harvested the first gall late last year, the second early this year and, when I brought that second gall home, I made a rookie error – I put it in the same jar as the first gall. Why was that an error? Because it meant that if/when anything emerged from the galls, I wouldn’t know which gall it came from.

200429 2 thistle gall fly gall
200516 diplolepis rosae gall (2)

A few weeks ago, in late April, creatures began emerging from one or other or both of the galls. At the time, because I found an empty pupa case poking out of a hole in the Thistle gall, I assumed the creatures had emerged from it – I wrote about that in What’s in a gall?, April 2020. It turns out I was wrong.

200518 3 bedeguar gall wasp and orthopelma mediator

After writing that piece, I decided to place the galls in two separate jars and, as I wrote in a post last week, two different wasp species have subsequently emerged from the Bedeguar gall wasp’s gall, the gall causer itself (Diplolepis rosae) (above, left) and a second wasp (above, right), which turns out to be the same species of wasp I wrote about in April and which, at the time, I thought had emerged from the Thistle gall fly’s gall.

200518 4 Orthopelma mediator

The empty pupa case is now a mystery but the second wasp’s identity has been confirmed as Orthopelma mediator, a parasite of the Bedeguar gall wasp. So, adding to the initial three that emerged, a total of four of these wasps have now hatched from that gall. Amazingly, there is only one previous record, from 1933, for this wasp in the Welsh records database but I don’t think that’s because it’s a rare find; it’s just that no one bothers to keep the galls to see what emerges from them and thus the wasp is under-recorded.

200518 5 Orthopelma mediator

So, I hope I have convinced you that this is a fascinating process which you might also like to try but do remember the moral of this tale of two galls: if you decide to bring home galls to see what might hatch out, make sure you put each and every gall in a separate jar!

Like this:

Like Loading...

137/366 Bedeguar gall wasp

16 Saturday May 2020

Posted by sconzani in insects, nature

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

Bedeguar gall wasp, British galls, British wasps, Diplolepis rosae, gall on dog-rose, gall wasps, galls, Robin's pincushion

You might remember that, a few months ago, I posted about the (supposedly) empty galls of the Bedeguar gall wasp I’d found during a wet walk at Cosmeston Lakes Country Park (Empty pincushions, January 2020). A week or so after writing that post, I was back at Cosmeston and remembered to harvest one of the galls, which has ever since been sitting in a sealed jar on my kitchen windowsill.

200516 diplolepis rosae gall (1)
200516 diplolepis rosae gall (2)
200516 diplolepis rosae gall (3)

Although the many holes in the gall made me think that all of its inhabitants had already hatched, I decided to wait and see if anything else appeared. Two days ago I noticed movement in the jar and, taking a closer look, found two different species of wasp had emerged.

200516 diplolepis rosae (1)

This is one of them, and I’m 99% certain this is the gall causer itself, the Bedeguar gall wasp, Diplolepis rosae, the offspring of the wasp that caused the gall to form in the first place. These wasps are so tiny – just 3-4 mm long – that most of us don’t usually see them so I was very pleased to have this one emerge from its gall.

200516 diplolepis rosae (2)

There is a bit of a story attached to the second wasp that emerged, and I am currently awaiting confirmation of its identity. As soon as I know more, I’ll write it up in a further post.

Like this:

Like Loading...

120/366 What’s in a gall?

29 Wednesday Apr 2020

Posted by sconzani in insects, nature

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

British galls, British wasps, parasite of Urophora cardui, parasitic wasp, Thistle gall fly, Thistle gall fly gall, Urophora cardui

Back in October 2017, I blogged about a gall I’d found (More galls, part 2), the gall created by the Thistle gall fly (Urophora cardui). Here are two photos of those galls: on the left, the gall growing on the thistle (in fact, there are two galls – there’s a second one, still quite small, in the background to the left) and, on the right, a dried version, which I harvested from a thistle plant at the end of last year and which I’ve since been keeping at home in a jar.

200429 1 thistle gall fly gall
200429 2 thistle gall fly gall

According to my research, the Thistle gall flies don’t usually emerge until June but last week flying creatures began emerging from the gall. On closer examination, I found the empty pupae case (pictured below right) poking out of one of several holes in the gall.

200429 3 thistle gall fly gall
200429 4 thistle gall fly gall parasite

So far, five little critters have hatched but these are not Thistle gall flies. They appear to be some kind of parasitic wasp, which I have not yet managed to identify – there are thousands of species of parasitic wasp and these are not the species that is normally considered the primary parasite of the Urophora cardui (which is a wasp called Eurytoma robusta).

200429 5 thistle gall fly gall parasite

Underside of wasp, photographed through glass of jar

I don’t know whether any Thistle gall fly larvae or pupae still survive within the gall or, indeed, whether anything else will yet emerge. So, for now, the gall remains in its jar, and I’ll post again if any other aliens appear.

This story has a sequel as all in this gall was not as it seemed – here’s a link to part 2, A Tale of two galls, May 2020.

200429 6 thistle gall fly gall parasite

One of the mystery wasps, sitting on the edge of the jar, as it was being released

Like this:

Like Loading...

94/366 Curiosity

03 Friday Apr 2020

Posted by sconzani in insects, nature

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

British wasps, Common wasp, Vespula vulgaris, wasp

This Common wasp (Vespula vulgaris), which was enjoying the warm sunshine on the front of the house this morning, seemed to be as curious about me as I was about it.

(Yes, the windows are a mess – I live in a flat in a Grade II listed building that’s well over 100 years old, and the windows, most of which still have Victorian glass in them, with all its imperfections, are in need of major repair. It’s a long and ongoing story.)

Like this:

Like Loading...

About me

sconzani

sconzani

I'm a writer and photographer; researcher and blogger; birder and nature lover; countryside rambler and city strider; volunteer and biodiversity recorder.

View Full Profile →

Follow earthstar on WordPress.com

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Recent blog posts

  • Fern Friday: Hart’s-tongue January 27, 2023
  • Feasting Chiffchaff January 26, 2023
  • A Water vole does lunch January 25, 2023
  • A cool cloud January 24, 2023
  • Snoozing January 23, 2023

From the archives

Follow me on Twitter

My Tweets

COPYRIGHT

Unless otherwise acknowledged, the text and photographs on this blog are my own and are subject to international copyright. Nothing may be downloaded or copied without my permission.

Fellow Earth Stars!

Blog at WordPress.com.

  • Follow Following
    • earthstar
    • Join 578 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • earthstar
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...
 

You must be logged in to post a comment.

    %d bloggers like this: