Anyone know what kind of wasp this is?

[TG83]

Well got a surprise today when I opened the mail, one of these fellas found their way into an express post bag:

Anyone have any idea what kind of wasp this is? I've never seen one of these kind before, all the photo's I've found of them on the net seem to come from South America, can't figure out an ID for them though and the package came from within Australia

Whatever he is he's a monster, about an inch and a half long and no idea what that thing is on its tail but hopefully not a stinger lol

[MORG]

It's a Braconid wasp.

As to species, wasps are so full of cryptic diversity that even the old wasp taxonomists have a hard time distinguishing them (and usually they use genitalia morphology as key characters).

[TG83]

Thanks for that MORG just had a bit of a read up and seems they are common in Australia, in Melbourne though I've only ever seen the European wasps, never even knew other kinds like this existed in other parts of Australia

[alphaomega]

wow thats one hell of a wasp! the other day i noticed a wasp similar to this sitting on our wood stack and no joke this thing had a thin tail/stinger thing 8cm long! the wasps whole body was only about 3cm..

[Amazonian]

You have probably all seen Docos' on Wasps but has anyone actually watched one do its thing in real life?. I watched one for about an hour as it dragged a huge stunned huntsman spider across the yard and over a 6' fence. Really interesting. I have watched them drag Insects into burrows and then cover the burrow only to come back minutes later with more insects to store ( for the wasp larvae), searching around a bit, looking for the concealed burrow. And man, wasps pack a punch when they sting you don't they.

[AndyAmine.]

I was amazed by how many crazy looking insects I came across when I moved from Melbourne to QLD.

Some of the bugs up here are, well, just a little scarey particularly the wasps, like something out of a story book and the fucking bull-ants (which are basicly wingless wasps) are totally bezerk.

[Zen Peddler]

Growing up in northern victoria we had all sorts of weird wasps - guys similar to that but all black and the red mud wasps were particularly scary looking.

[Zen Peddler]

Also we have both European wasps (yellow jackets) and common wasps here in aus and they are almost identical, but both also semi aggressive.

[ThunderIdeal]

queensland just has so many bugs

hardly any of them sting you though. that wasp LOOKS harmless to me, that long thing has got to be an ovipositor right? for implanting eggs into brains and stuff. not human brains though.

[Sonny Jim]

You have probably all seen Docos' on Wasps but has anyone actually watched one do its thing in real life?. I watched one for about an hour as it dragged a huge stunned huntsman spider across the yard and over a 6' fence. Really interesting. I have watched them drag Insects into burrows and then cover the burrow only to come back minutes later with more insects to store ( for the wasp larvae), searching around a bit, looking for the concealed burrow. And man, wasps pack a punch when they sting you don't they.

 

Yeah me to!

I was sitting under a paper bark tree, when a distressed, large huntsman fell out of one of the tree's higher branches and started frantically running away. It was then that I saw a black wasp chase the spider. Once it captured it, the wasp stung it multiple times until the spider had died/given up. Then the wasp tried to carry it back up the tree, I guess to take it to its nest and eat it. Though the spider was too large for the wasp to carry. So the wasp quick removed each of the spiders legs with surgical precision. Once the spiders legs were removed the wasp quickly picked it up and carried it back up the tree.

Like you, I had only ever seen this kind of wasp/spider action on docos. It was truly an amazing site and the wasps speed and technique was so fast and efficient.

Edited November 11, 2010 by Sonny Jim

[TG83]

Wow never really knew much about wasps, haven't seen documentaries on them before but amazed at this information about them. Only ever really knew to avoid being stung by them but amazed to hear how they breed and survive. Been living in a box here in Melbourne, reading some reports at the moment from the CSIRO stating there is some 14,800 types of ants, bees and wasps in Australia. Haven't really ventured much out of Victoria to get an idea of the biodiversity in this country, family owns a few farms in VIC and the most we see there is few different snakes, feral cats, heaps of mosquitos, honey bees and the european wasps. All the farming must have driven the more native species into other areas.

Speaking of common ones, got stung by a honey bee this morning while potting up a few seeds, thought doing it at 6am before the sun was up would avoid them but I was wrong, first time it's happened so glad I'm not allergic to them.

The amount of honey bees and european wasps around here at the moment is higher than I've ever seen, they are literally outnumbering flys. Probably not a good thing seeing as they're introduced and their lifestyle of taking out other insects, huntsmans have been taking cover inside the house over the last week too, after reading the above I don't blame them either!