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Photo#390243
Tiny wasp from white oak leaf - Baryscapus - female

Tiny wasp from white oak leaf - Baryscapus - Female
Westborough Wildlife Management Area, Westborough, Worcester County, Massachusetts, USA
April 29, 2010
Size: ~1 mm
In March, I collected a white oak leaf from the forest floor and placed it in a Ziploc bag. It has one of these galls:

and several of these:

Yesterday (4/28/10), I looked in the bag and found two of the tiny wasps pictured above, as well as this one, which clearly emerged from the larger gall:

The timing of their emergence makes me wonder if these smaller wasps could be inquilines from the larger gall, but they could have fit inside the smaller galls, so perhaps they emerged from those and happened to do so at the same time as the larger wasp. However, I've looked and haven't found any exit holes in the smaller galls.

Moved
Moved from Tetrastichinae.
Det. Michael W. Gates; "Group needs revision; adults not identifiable to species."

Moved
Moved from Eulophidae.
Christer Hansson: "Tetrastichinae, a female"

Moved
Moved from Ants, Bees, Wasps and Sawflies. Thanks for all your help with these little wasps.

Eulophidae…
Wing venation, short antennae with only 4 funicle segments, 4-segmented tarsi, and subtriangular prepectus point to this family. The clubbed antennae indicates a female (males with clubs are very rare). Since we are at the end of the size spectrum with regard to this family (1mm), it is quite possible that this is a hyperparasitoid that attacked another primary parasitoid within the gall. Difficult to know for sure because this is a highly specialized group that contains many different primary and hyperparasitoid species.

See reference here.

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