Speckled Gall Wasp - Cynips mirabilis

Moved

Moved from Torymidae.
Your gall ID looks great to me--the torymid was a parasitoid of the cynipid that caused the gall. I'm not sure whether the larva you photographed is a cynipid or a torymid.

… Charley Eiseman, 18 December, 2010 - 10:25am

Thanks so much

the larva turned into the wasp, and I watched it pretty closely, so I'm fairly certain it is torymid. I guess I need to go collect more of these galls and see what happens.

… Lynette Elliott, 18 December, 2010 - 10:34am

How did you keep the larva alive

after removing it from the gall? Just curious... my rearing techniques could use some improvement.

… Charley Eiseman, 18 December, 2010 - 10:36am

keeping larva alive

Um... if my memory serves me I put it back into the broken ball the best I could and didn't mess with it any more. I raised more than one of them though and I think at least one was outside the ball. I've found that if the larva is removed when it is at its peak it will transform into the wasp just left out in the open. I left this guy below out in the open and recorded its transformation (most of the way)

I'll go collect a bunch more of these and do a larger experiment, watching some of the larva much more closely. The funny thing is, I think all of them that emerged were the parasitoid.

… Lynette Elliott, 18 December, 2010 - 10:40am

Moved

Moved from Speckled Gall Wasp.

… Lynette Elliott, 23 July, 2010 - 11:47pm