Small wasp

Roadwart · Post by **Roadwart** » Mon May 04, 2009 1:34 pm

No idea what species this is. My wife spotted it in the kitchen & just whacked an old spice jar (cleaned of course) over it & popped it in the freezer for me. Stack of 20 input images using Zerene stacker Pmax.

Also shot this fly but I didn`t leave it long enough to thaw out hence the ice still on the eye. This was after attcking it with a 1600W hairdryer! 12 images stacked in Zerene stacker. Dmap output with slight bristle retouching from the Pmax output.

As always, comments welcome.

Harold Gough · Post by **Harold Gough** » Tue May 05, 2009 1:02 am

Roadwart wrote: No idea what species this is.

Identification of insects usually requires the full insect to be shown. Wing venation is important in wasp identification.

Harold

Roadwart · Post by **Roadwart** » Tue May 05, 2009 3:36 am

Thanks for that Harold. I`ll try to get some shots of the wings & also try to measure the wee beastie.

lauriek · Post by **lauriek** » Tue May 05, 2009 3:39 am

It's got the look of an ichneumon to my eyes but it could be one of the digger wasps, hard to say seeing such a limited view of the bug! Nice shots though, stacking seems to be working well...

Roadwart · Post by **Roadwart** » Tue May 05, 2009 4:46 am

Thanks Laurie. My immediate thought was an ichneumon due to it being very slender. As I said in response to Harold, I`ll try to get a full length shot & also some of the wings too.

I have got the lighting a bit better in this one. Been fiddling with the cam settings & also split up the fibre bundle. Its now about 60/40 with the 60% on the RH side of the lens. I also took the foil off the fibres so the light was able to bleed through the walls & act as a diffuser. Camera was set to ISO400 f/8 on both lenses & 0.5s shutter speed rear curtain flash.

Roadwart · Post by **Roadwart** » Tue May 05, 2009 2:34 pm

I managed to get a shot showing the wing venation. The shadow is actually the second wing out of focus between the main wing & the lens.

Also managed a rather poor shot of the overall wasp before I managed to knock the abdomen off

Rough measurements are abdomen 8mm long, thorax 6mm long, head approx 1.5mm front to back.

lauriek · Post by **lauriek** » Mon May 11, 2009 2:55 am

I'm not good enough to tell what stuff is from wing venation yet, but the whole body shot definitely has that ichneumon look about it to me...

Small wasp

Small wasp

Re: Small wasp