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Berlin - May 2017

Hello everyone,

My Wife was looking at photos and noticed a strange insect walking on the egg of a Lanius collurio. I don't see wings so i don't know if it is a diptera or not. I don't have any other photos. I was photographing the egg and not looking for insects.

any ideas what it is? why is it walking around on the egg?

Best wishes,
John

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I think I see a large spur on the left hind tibia which would be very uncharacteristic of dipterans. Such a glossy body and the spur then give me the choice between Hymenoptera and Coleoptera. The slender legs then make me choose for Hymenoptera. Any chance of it being an ant?

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Hello Paul,

the spur is what confuses me. I think that it is better to post here for more opinions. Honestly, i didn't think of Hymenoptera so a wasp or an ant it could be. I don't see wings in the photo but it was gone in the next photo so i assume that it flew. Perhaps the wings were not captured in the photo when it prepared for flight. I didn't ee it on the egg when i made the photos. I was concentrating on the egg and the nest being in focus.

Thank you for replying, Paul.

Best wishes,
John

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Hymenopterans of the family Encyrtidae have strong spur on the apex of tibia and thickened basitarsus. This seems to be the case here. This modification concerns the middle pair of legs. Honestly, I cannot say that on this picture the modified leg is the middle (mesothoracic) leg, the picture is unclear. Let us believe it is - if so, the family is known to us.

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Hello Jan,

Encyrtidae is an excellent suggestion! I didn't think about a chalcid wasp. Very interesting. I've seen Encyrtidae come out of true bug eggs before but i seem to have forgotten what they look like. I don't know why it was roaming around the bird nest but i'll keep investigating this event. I should've inspected the nest quickly but tolerant birds can become distressed very quickly, so time is of the essence. I got quite familiar with this pair of L. collurio. For some reason, they only had one egg (the one in the photo.) The immature (from this egg) let me get close enough to make nice photos of it sleeping a few weeks later (but it kept one eye open) :)

I've studied birds since i was a child. Birds are my favorite animals.

Best wishes,
John

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By the way, here is a crop of the egg which better depicts he size of the chalcid. I should've thought about a chalcid wasp.

Thanks again, Paul and Jan.