When I was picking raspberries yesterday, I noticed one that seemed a little odd. A closer look quickly revealed some bug eggs. I hauled the 10X loupe out of my pocket to take an even closer look, and saw that one of the eggs had a round hole in the top. No "hatch cover" attached, no sign of the nymph. Then I rolled the berry around a little bit, noticed an odd black lump underneath part of the raft of eggs, and took a closer look at that.
Lo and behold, the odd black lump turned out to be a small wasp. I'm guessing that it's an egg parasite, recently emerged from the one egg with a hole in it.
The wasp seems to be a bit mobility challenged. A few seconds after taking the first picture shown here, the wasp literally fell off the raft of eggs and fortuitously got snagged on one of the berry fibers a couple of millimeters below the raft. This may explain why it was still present on the raft of eggs, rather than having flown off to find a mate and some fresh food for the next generation.
Whole frame:
100% crop:
Whole frame:
100% crop
Not my usual sort of imagery, but I thought you might find this interesting!
Canon T1i, Canon MP-E 65 at 1X, f/8, Canon 580 EX II flash diffused through paper.
--Rik
Edit: fix typos
Raspberry, bug eggs, egg parasite wasp
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Raspberry, bug eggs, egg parasite wasp
Last edited by rjlittlefield on Fri Oct 26, 2018 8:42 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Nice and interesting.
Troels Holm, biologist (retired), environmentalist, amateur photographer.
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