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Photo#1336786
2 Scale like or mollusk like creatures under dead wood.  Kept in terrarium, flies emerged, laid eggs. - Microdon

2 Scale like or mollusk like creatures under dead wood. Kept in terrarium, flies emerged, laid eggs. - Microdon
West Lafayette, Tippecanoe County, Indiana, USA
January 22, 2017
Size: 9mm

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Is this even an arthropod? Pupa? - Microdon Is this even an arthropod? Pupa? - Microdon Scale like insect on dead wood - Microdon 2 Scale like or mollusk like creatures under dead wood.  Kept in terrarium, flies emerged, laid eggs. - Microdon Scale like insect on dead wood - Microdon Scale like insect on dead wood - Microdon - female Scale like insect on dead wood, this fly emerged - Microdon - female 2 Scale like or mollusk like creatures under dead wood.  Kept in terrarium, flies emerged, laid eggs. - Microdon - female 2 Scale like or mollusk like creatures under dead wood.  Kept in terrarium, flies emerged, laid eggs. - Microdon

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Microdon?


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Ken nailed it
The genus Microdon (member of the Syrphidae, the flower flies) has these weird larvae that live in ant nests. Evidently they can chemically mimic the smells of ants, and so are protected by them. When the larvae were first discovered, at least one researcher thought they were not insects but crustaceans or something similar.

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