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Braconid wasp

Braconidae

Description:

Braconid parasitoid wasp eggs & Lime Butterfly 'Papilio demoleus caterpillar . The wasp in the picture( family Eurytomidae ) is a hyperparasitoid http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperparasi...

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5 Comments

Maria dB
Maria dB 10 years ago

Great spotting

LaurenZarate
LaurenZarate 10 years ago

Amazing! Wonderful pictures.

John La Salle
John La Salle 10 years ago

I've gone through and made a couple of comments.
sometimes pretty difficult to tell with these really small things.

John La Salle
John La Salle 10 years ago

Nice spotting and photo.
This really shows the complexity of nature.
The wasp in the picture walking on the cocoons looks to be in the family Eurytomidae (I would guess Eurytoma sp.). Eurytoma is an amazingly large and diverse genus, with a remarkable range of host associations which can include phytophagy as well as acting as a parasitoid or hyperparasitoid. They are extremely difficult to identify to species - even with properly mounted specimens.
In this case this species is a hyperparasitoid (a parasitoid of a parasitoid), which seems to be checking out the pupae in the cocoons. Not an unusual thing at all for parasitoids to have other wasps which attack them.
So, you have three species in the picture:
the caterpillar, the wasp which formed the cocoons, and the wasp walking on the cocoons.

Seema Swami
Spotted by
Seema Swami

Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India

Spotted on Jul 31, 2013
Submitted on Dec 22, 2013

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