Ichneumon wasp  (Ophion luteus)

Description

This slender parasitic wasp has a yellowish or orange coloured body with a distinctive ‘waist’ (2) and a very short ovipositor(3). They are sometimes mistakenly called flies, but they are wasps, with two pairs of clear membranous wings (3) and long antennae(4). There are 1200 species of ichneumon wasp in Britain alone (3) and this is the largest family of insects known, with over 60,000 species worldwide (4).

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