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Thread for Other Invertebrates Not Covered By Other Threads (we have other threads for arachnids, bees & wasps, butterflies and moths, and flies)

gentlegreen said:
I spotted one of those the other day - doubtless hoping to lay eggs on the larvae of the bees - haven't managed to photograph one yet
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If you've got tawny mining bees, they are the preferred host of the bee fly so you will doubtless see both around.
Bee flies are actually great pollinators of certain species of flowering plant so they aren't all bad and serve a good purpose.
 
Epona said:
Today I found and learned about the larvae of the Common Green Lacewing (Chrysoperla carnea).

Funny looking things.

They are predatory and have large mandibles with which to incapacitate and eat their prey (aphids).
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I buy lacewing larvae online to keep aphids under control in the garden. They're voracious eaters and will happily try to take a bite out of "prey" as large as humans! (It's noticeable but not enough to hurt)

There's absolutely loads of millipedes where I am now, never seen so many in one place before.
 
Surrey this afternoon (couldn't get close enough to get a decent macro shot, even though one landed on my dad's shoulder at one point!):

IMG_20230615_160737_115.jpg

There were loads of them all fluttering around a little island in a little stream, it was an idyllic and almost magical scene (apart from the dead wood pigeon in the stream...)
 
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Epona said:
Yeah sorry I have edited my post accordingly - I had about 1 hour of kip last night (bloody insomnia) and a busy day today, my brain is drifting off a bit :D

Doesn't look like there is anything for snails so they are welcome here.
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Good job. Would have been a very awkward silence waiting for them to leave
 
I’m glad this thread has popped up again as someone might know what the insect I saw the other day was. I’d never seen one before. It was a medium small hover fly sort of thing with a black body and red wings, on stony moorland. There were two of them and they didn’t land on any of the brambles and bracken they were flying over, even though they seemed as though they would any moment. So I couldn’t get a photo.
 
Saunders said:
I’m glad this thread has popped up again as someone might know what the insect I saw the other day was. I’d never seen one before. It was a medium small hover fly sort of thing with a black body and red wings, on stony moorland. There were two of them and they didn’t land on any of the brambles and bracken they were flying over, even though they seemed as though they would any moment. So I couldn’t get a photo.
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Whereabouts in the world/UK was this?

I'd guess at some sort of day flying moth - cinnabar moth or something like that, but knowing where it was seen could help narrow it down.
 
Epona said:
What are we seeing here? If it was flying around I would probably give a loose ID to the one underneath (or being eaten) as a Eupeodes hoverfly (incomplete bands on the abdomen) I think? Still learning this stuff!

Brilliant photos :)
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Robber fly eating something else I think?
 
Epona said:
Whereabouts in the world/UK was this?

I'd guess at some sort of day flying moth - cinnabar moth or something like that, but knowing where it was seen could help narrow it down.
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South west U.K. Its wing movement was very fast, like a hover fly, so there was a black body with two blurry red patches on either side, as it cruised over but never landed on low scrubby cover. I’ve searched photos of a cinnabar moth and I don’t think it was one of them
 
Saunders said:
South west U.K. Its wing movement was very fast, like a hover fly, so there was a black body with two blurry red patches on either side, as it cruised over but never landed on low scrubby cover. I’ve searched photos of a cinnabar moth and I don’t think it was one of them
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6 spot burnet moth?

Just taking a wild stab in the dark, thinking about things that are black with a bit of red on them :D
 
Epona said:
What are we seeing here? If it was flying around I would probably give a loose ID to the one underneath (or being eaten) as a Eupeodes hoverfly (incomplete bands on the abdomen) I think? Still learning this stuff!

Brilliant photos :)
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Not sure tbh, the long pointy proboscis makes me think mosquito and it does look similar to some species but it was massive and eating a hoverfly... Might try and get a photograph through a magnifier if I can find another one that'll stay still long enough.
 
iona said:
Not sure tbh, the long pointy proboscis makes me think mosquito and it does look similar to some species but it was massive and eating a hoverfly... Might try and get a photograph through a magnifier if I can find another one that'll stay still long enough.
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I think Callie was right when she said robber fly, they predate on other species.
 
Epona said:
I think Callie was right when she said robber fly, they predate on other species.
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I thought about them but when I googled UK species none of them looked even close, couldn't find a proper list of all the species we have here though so probably right.
 
Last week while on holiday in a caravan in Hampshire we had what appeared to be a wasp in our caravan that first tried to grab a crumb from a plate (it was actually carrying it while flying) then after being scared into dropping its crumb it landed on a plate with a chicken bone (KFC) on it and tried to eat scraps of meat from the bone. Apart from its eating behaviour it looked and behaved exactly like a wasp. I've seen hoverflies that were stripy like wasps before but they were smaller, slimmer and pointier. What could this have been arthropod fans?
 
maomao said:
Last week while on holiday in a caravan in Hampshire we had what appeared to be a wasp in our caravan that first tried to grab a crumb from a plate (it was actually carrying it while flying) then after being scared into dropping its crumb it landed on a plate with a chicken bone (KFC) on it and tried to eat scraps of meat from the bone. Apart from its eating behaviour it looked and behaved exactly like a wasp. I've seen hoverflies that were stripy like wasps before but they were smaller, slimmer and pointier. What could this have been arthropod fans?
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My guess would be a wasp.

They chew up stuff like meat and take it back to the nest to feed their larvae
 
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