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Apiomorpha munita
Compare with four spined version here http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/702... The four long spines are replaced here with four flattened blades. This bladed gall (female) is about 50mm from tip to tip. A very dense cluster of male tube galls was found about 200mm further along the same tree stem and are probably the same species.
In a suburban nature reserve.
There are only 42 described species of Apiomorpha and after comparing all except two A munita seems the most likely here. In support of this I also found some good examples from SA Forestry of a species manifesting variety of shapes of galls based upon the species of host eucalyptus.
http://www.brisbaneinsects.com/brisbane_...
http://bie.ala.org.au/species/urn:lsid:b...
Spotted on Sep 21, 2014
Submitted on Sep 21, 2014
5 Comments
Thank you so very much Doc. Great to know we're not too far off track. :)
Correct ID. We're working on the taxonomy of this "species" and eventually it will be split into multiple different species. Currently there are three subspecies recognised: A. munita munita on red gums, grey gums and maidenarias; A. munita tereticornuta on boxes and ironbarks, and A. munita malleensis on mallees. The galls can look the same and are somewhat dependent on the host eucalyptus species.
Adult females of A. munita can live up to five years, and even years after the gall in which she lives has dried out.
PS. The female gall here may not be as old as it looks... it was still fairly flexible.
I agree entirely Martin. I was going through the variations on volcano leaf galls last night (SA Forestry) and it became obvious that variation of female gall structure is considerably dependent upon E species. There are only 42 species of Apiomorpha total and only A munita looks at all similar to these.
I think the brown one is from last year or earlier.
The group of males on the green one is neat.
I think this is very variable and would be munita also.
The variability might be due to the species of eucalyptus and the location on the branch. I found a montane one which I presumed to be a different species and was surprised by the comment by Lyn Cook .
http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/535...