Strange Flying Insect
While Renee and myself were visiting Plainjanes house in Cumbria, we have been busying ourselves visiting places of interest.
We went down the road to have a walk by the river Eden. Although we have got plenty to blog about and lots of photos to post, I decided that my first post on this blog would show a strange insect that I happened to stumble across.
| I found this insect drowning in a pool next to the river and after searching on the net, I cannot identify it.Its about 50mm long and has wasp like colouring, I can only assume it fell out of a tree and would have met its doom until I came along and rescued it.
At first we figured it could be a type of dragonfly but its legs are too long, a single pair of wings and its body seems less delicate. Even trying to match it with pictures of craneflys or types of british wasps has even left us stumped! |
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If anyone happens to stumble on this blog entry, please feel free to leave a comment and perhaps answer my curiosity for nature.
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June 11th, 2006 at 7:02 pm
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Digger or Threadwaisted Wasps
Both the blue digger and golden digger wasp are beneficial, appearing in the morning and flying over the lawn all day, then leaving in early evening. Digger wasps are solitary wasps with each female working alone to produce her offspring instead of having the help of several workers as in social chambers or cells. These chambers are provisioned with food for the offspring. After the eggs are laid in or on the “provision,” the offspring are on their own to live and grow to adults that emerge the following summer.
The blue digger about 3/4-inch long is shiny metallic blue on both the wings and body. This slender wasp provisions its nests with grasshoppers and crickets. Also, the inch-long golden digger wasp with shiny gold markings on the face and abdomen uses grasshoppers and crickets as stored food for their offspring. Often, wasps can be seen flying about a foot or less above the ground. Others may be perched on shrubs and trees.
Due to their large size, they are assumed to be extremely dangerous. Actually, they are not aggressive but curious and investigate persons and pets near their burrows. Stings are quite rare. One can walk safely through them as they hover over the lawn.
that info was taken from:
http://ohioline.osu.edu/hyg-fact/2000/2143.html
June 11th, 2006 at 7:47 pm
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It looks as if many bug experts can have problems identifiying some insects most of the time.
This page has wasps which look similar to our specimin above…
There are digger wasps, paper wasps and potter wasps… not all of the picures on this following link are all european though.
http://www.whatsthatbug.com/wasps.html
Also here is a picture of a field digger wasp.
The most interesting pic I have found so far that resembles our type of wasp is the one in the link below.
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/~ucbt266/pages/social_evolution.html
The picture on the right shows a group of large wasps, no name is given but as the picture shows. It could be a social wasp and lives in a group…
Could that rule out the possibility of it being a solitary field/paper/potter wasp afterall?
Who wouldda thought that our drowning insect could provoke such interest in wasps?
June 11th, 2006 at 8:02 pm
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could it be one of these Digger Wasps?
June 12th, 2006 at 5:04 pm
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*shivers*
have I ever mentioned that I HATE creepy crawlies and insects and things
July 3rd, 2006 at 4:38 am
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I was in a montanous area of the Dominican Republic and i observed a rather odd-looking wasp-type insect that flew and dig holes in a mound of soft sand. I was surprised because I thought insects only dig in organic materials. I typed insect+flying+digger on google and I was directed to this page. But having read the blog I know this is a common insect. It was raining and I had only my phone camera, the low light didn’t permit me to catch a sanp or two. Probably I’ll return to the area next week week and I’ll take a more proficient piece of photo equipment. If my description of the insect sound weird please contact me!
Thanks (I am not a scientist only a courious fellow.)
July 10th, 2006 at 8:47 pm
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wat u have there is possibly 1 of 2 things1 a horntail wood wasp or a giant wood wasp i am not sure though but i have a question up here in canada at my cottage near petibourgh me and my dad found this bug on the bottom of 1 of our lawn chairs when we were fishing off the dock.
it looked like a dragonfly it had the long body of a dragonfly but it only had 2 wings instead of 4 and it have large pincers like u would find on stag beetles. this insect was approx 4 inchs long and had a wing span to match its length of 4 inch. unfortunetly my dad who hates bugs killed it befor i could get a pic so i just have the description if any one can tell me the name and species of this insect me and my dad would be very great full. if u do find the name of this insect email me at metallica_fan54@hotmail.com
September 29th, 2008 at 11:47 am
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i have an insect like this one it is wierd. but mine has a little longer body and what looks like to be a stinger about 4 inches long i found it is Du Bois PA 15801 i searched and searched to see what it is but i honestly cannot find it. the date i found it was 9-28-08 but i would like to know what kind of insect it is also.
August 23rd, 2009 at 3:55 am
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that flying bug you talk about!
i saw on today in bradford 22/08/09 sounds like a helicopter when flying
ido have a pic on my phone and are trying to identify .