What The ......

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bankst
Posts: 69
Joined: Thu Jul 31, 2008 9:50 am

What The ......

Post by bankst »

What The ......:

Well this made me look twice. I was walking up Northwich High Street on Saturday, (just outside Dorothy Perkins as it happens) and I noticed people were stepping over / walking around something on the ground. As I got nearer, I realised it was an enormous wasp, unfortunately dead, but still spectacular. Bemused shoppers looked on in horror as I crouched over it to take close-up photos, one attached.

I confess I had to look it up, never having seen one before. It is of course the Giant Wood Wasp or Banded Horntail (Urocerus gigas). A totally harmless sawfly, it's "sting" is an ovipositor, which the female uses to drill into dead wood to lay its eggs. There are woods nearby, Furey Wood and Carey Park, but this one must have strayed off course and into town and was probably swatted by an intellectually inferior Homo sapiens. Serves it right for being such a good Hornet mimic.

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Giant Wood Wasp (Urocerus gigas)
Giant Wood Wasp (Urocerus gigas)
RachelMC
Posts: 460
Joined: Mon May 17, 2010 1:04 pm
Location: Chester

Re: What The ......

Post by RachelMC »

Great post !

I've re-posted this to our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/recordlrc/

Thanks,
Rachel

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